WASHINGTON -- A group of business, government and religious leaders announced Tuesday the creation of a coalition to press for ending the U.S. ban on sales of food and medicine to Cuba.

The group, called Americans for Humanitarian Trade With Cuba, includes David Rockefeller, chairman of his family's trust; Archer Daniels Midland chairman Dwayne Andreas; and former U.S. officials Carla Hills, President Reagan's trade representative, and Lloyd Bentsen, President Clinton's first treasury secretary.

With little more than a week before Pope John Paul II travels to Cuba, the coalition is seeking to portray the 36-year U.S. trade embargo as inhumane and unworthy of U.S. ideals, calling it the harshest in the world. The pope has also criticized the trade ban, which raises Cuba's costs by forcing it to rely on more-distant exporters.

Working in conjunction with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the new group has vowed to press Congress to approve legislation to allow the direct sale of food and medicine. Such sales are banned under the Cuba embargo, although Americans may donate food and even sell licensed medical products through charity groups in Cuba.

Witness to hunger

Retired Army Gen. John J. Sheehan, former head of the U.S. Atlantic Command, recalled that he supervised processing of nearly 40,000 Cuban refugees seeking U.S. asylum at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, beginning in 1994. Many were children suffering from malnutrition, he said.

``We can no longer support a policy which causes suffering of the most vulnerable -- women, children and the elderly,'' Sheehan said. ``It is time for us to correct this policy and its unintended effects on the innocent people of Cuba.''

The coalition, which reflects the private sector's strongest push yet on Cuba policy, drew immediate criticism from some Cuban-American politicians. U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, D-Miami, said the group was mistakenly deflecting responsibility for Cuba's misery from President Fidel Castro to the United States. Anti-embargo business leaders, she added, are motivated by greed.

``This is really an unholy alliance between the usual suspects who are always anti-embargo, the church groups and now Wall Street,'' she said. ``These businessmen would be wheeling and dealing with Mussolini if that dictator were still around, as long as there's a buck to be made.''

Battle lines form

The debate is focusing on bills authorizing food and medical sales proposed by Rep. Esteban Torres, D-Calif., and Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn. The House version has more than 90 co-sponsors, according to Torres.

Republican opponents, who control key foreign affairs committees, voice confidence that they can bottle up the legislation.

The new coalition is counting on pressure generated by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which represents Fortune 500 companies and small businesses across the United States, and the National Council of Churches, which claims to represent 53 million Americans. A Cuban American, Hector Irastorza Jr., is the council's executive director.

In anticipation of the pope's first trip to Cuba, Castro opponents in Cuba and in exile plan to release a document today that outlines criteria for a political transition, including a general amnesty for all political prisoners, elections by direct and secret ballot, and greater freedom of political and economic activity.

Spearheaded by U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, R-Miami, the document is signed by island dissidents including Gustavo Arcos, president of the Cuban Committee for Human Rights; and by exiles including Carlos Alberto Montaner, head of the Cuban Liberal Union, and Jose Basulto, founder of Brothers to the Rescue.