By Carol Giacomo,

WASHINGTON — President Clinton sought to look "beyond Castro" Friday, easing efforts to isolate Havana with initiatives aimed at allaying Cuban humanitarian needs and loosening citizen dependence on the communist government.

Clinton said he would permit a resumption of direct humanitarian charter flights to the island, allow Cuban-Americans to send $1,200 per year to relatives in Cuba and expedite sales of medicine and medical supplies.

Officials said the measures would take effect in several weeks. One goal was to boost the Cuban Catholic Church's role as a peaceful counterweight to the repressive Cuban state, they said.

The decision, triggered in part by Pope John Paul II's recent historic visit to Cuba, left in place a nearly four-decades-old U.S. economic embargo and senior officials insisted that bedrock policy would not be altered.

But they indicated a willingness to also consider other unspecified steps that would further increase interaction between Americans and Cubans, although not their governments.

"The Cuban people are beginning to think beyond (President Fidel) Castro. We need to do the same," Secretary of State Madeleine Albright told reporters.

"We can help to lessen the Cuban people's dependence on the Cuban state by addressing humanitarian needs, aiding the development of a civil society and strengthening the role of the church and other nongovernmental organizations," she said.

"By so doing, we can begin to empower Cuban citizens and help them prepare to make a peaceful transition to democracy." The reaction from Cuba and within the United States was mixed. Castro told the CNN television network the measures seemed "positive" on first impression. But Foreign Minister Roberto Robaina called the moves unacceptable "crumbs."

The new measures reflect a shift in Clinton's approach to Cuba as well as increasing support in Congress for humanitarian initiatives toward the island, which the United States has often demonized as the hemisphere's only communist state.

In 1994, Clinton banned cash remittances by Americans to Cuba to increase pressure on Havana to keep its citizens from fleeing in boats on the high seas to the United States. He also canceled regular charter flights between Havana and Miami in 1996. Two years later, Clinton joined Congress in tightening the U.S. embargo with enactment of the Helms-Burton Act after Havana shot down two planes carrying four anti-Castro activists. The act discourages foreign investment in Cuba.

Clinton was then in the midst of a presidential reelection campaign and the votes of the politically potent Cuban-American community in Florida were seen as crucial to victory.

Since then, administration officials have indicated an interest in altering their tough approach toward Cuba.

Clinton's decision was given impetus by congressional efforts to enact legislation that would clear the way for more humanitarian aid to reach Cuba as well as the pontiff's visit.

During that visit in January, the pope called both for Cuba to open up to the world and for the world to open up to it. He also reiterated opposition to the U.S. embargo on Havana.

The change also comes shortly after a U.S. admission that conflicting international policies to encourage democracy in Cuba — a tough U.S. approach versus a European policy of engagement — have yielded little progress.

"The overarching goal of American policy must be to promote a peaceful transition to democracy on the island," Clinton said in a statement, adding:

"The measures I have announced today are designed to build upon that (papal) visit, to support the Cuban people through the hardships and difficulties ahead, to contribute to the growth of a civil society and to help prepare for a peaceful transition to democracy."

Castro told CNN he wanted full details of the measures before making a judgment but "they seem positive to us."

Robaina, speaking to reporters on a visit to Geneva, said: "It does not go to the heart of the problem ... For the Cuban people, the blockade has to be lifted, and not just eased ... When humanitarian help appears with conditions ... it is a political maneuver which we are not prepared to accept."

The plan was criticized by leading U.S. opponents of Castro, like Sen. Jesse Helms, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and co-author of the Helms-Burton law.

Helms viewed Clinton's decision as a "serious mistake" because it undercut his effort to pass a bipartisan law to send humanitarian relief to Cuba, spokesman Mark Thiessen said.

Professor William LeoGrande of American University said the U.S. measures would have a profound impact on the standard of living of ordinary Cubans and their health care as well as improve Cuban views of the United States. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said the relaxations represented a "good first step" that should be followed by allowing direct sales of food and medicine to Cuba and, eventually, a complete lifting of the embargo.

© Reuters Ltd.