By Pamela Constable
                  Washington Post Staff Writer
                  Thursday, January 7, 1999; Page B01

                  To Jay Fernandez, a conservative Cuban American businessman, the
                  Clinton administration's decision this week to permit more travel to Cuba
                  and allow more food, mail and money to be sent there is a "cruel joke" on
                  the Cuban people and an undeserved reward to Fidel Castro's repressive
                  regime.

                  "None of this will make any difference to my relatives in Cuba," said
                  Fernandez, who directs a Virginia-based advocacy group called Casa
                  Cuba. And the easing of the trade embargo, he complained, is being
                  initiated even though Cuban dissidents have been beaten on live television
                  in recent weeks and five Cuban diplomats have been expelled from the
                  United States on suspicion of spying.

                  "So why do we turn around and reward them?" he asked angrily.

                  But to Jorge du Brueil, a retired Cuban American educator in Rockville,
                  the administration's move is a "very modest beginning" toward his dream of
                  normalizing U.S. relations with his homeland -- and ultimately dropping the
                  37-year American embargo against its communist government.

                  "It doesn't get to the heart of the problem, but I'd rather have things going
                  in this direction than the opposite," said du Brueil, a board member of the
                  nonprofit Committee for Cuban Democracy. "A lot of people in the United
                  States don't know the real story about what's happening in Cuba, and if
                  more of them start flying down there, it may lead to other things."

                  Like every change in American policy toward Cuba, the administration's
                  latest shift is being hotly debated among the Washington region's estimated
                  10,000 Cuban Americans. Some see it as a victory for anti-Castro groups
                  that successfully pressed officials not to ease restrictions even further;
                  others see it as a victory for pro-detente groups that argue that more open
                  channels will inevitably weaken Castro's rule.

                  The new policy will allow any U.S. resident to send up to $1,200 a year to
                  private Cuban citizens, increase charter flights between Cuban and
                  American cities, establish direct mail service and allow American
                  companies to sell food and agricultural products to private groups in Cuba.

                  The administration also is permitting the Baltimore Orioles to visit Cuba this
                  spring for an exhibition game with the Cuban national team, which will be
                  allowed to travel to Baltimore for a similar event.

                  "I am content because this will show ordinary Cubans the generosity of the
                  American people, and give them a chance to integrate more in the world,"
                  said Eduardo Barada, co-owner of the Habana Village nightclub in the
                  District, who has hosted numerous performances by visiting Cuban
                  musicians.

                  Virginia Schofield, a Cuban American artist in the District who is active in
                  the Committee for Cuban Democracy, praised the administration for
                  opening up mail service. But she said anything short of lifting the embargo
                  will bring little real change in Cuba.

                  "What the administration has done is pretty miserly," she argued. In recent
                  weeks, she said, a panel of prominent Americans sponsored by the
                  Council on Foreign Relations has called for a review of U.S. policy toward
                  Cuba, and a similar commission has been proposed by members of
                  Congress. "I think they are just throwing a bone at them, but in concrete
                  terms it is just a tiny little opening."

                  Frank Calzon, a Cuban American who directs the District-based Center
                  for a Free Cuba, warned that some of the provisions of the new U.S.
                  policy may not be agreed to by Castro's government and that others could
                  benefit Cuban officials more than citizens.

                  "The road to hell is paved with good intentions," Calzon said. Havana, he
                  argued, is not likely to accept direct mail service from the United States
                  because it would lose millions of dollars in fees from private shipping
                  services. And if American athletes start traveling to Cuba, he added, "they
                  should go tell Castro to stop persecuting Cuban ballplayers for their
                  views."

                  The worst thing, Calzon said, is that the U.S. proposal "raises false
                  expectations. They say they will sell food to small, self-employed buyers,
                  but how will they get the money to buy it? So far, the Cuban government
                  won't even let the Catholic church buy wholesale milk."
 

                           © Copyright 1999 The Washington Post Company