HAVANA -- Chanting ``Freedom! Freedom!'' six Cuban dissidents on Friday ended a 40-day fast they began as a plea for ``respect for human rights and the release of political prisoners.'' About 30 supporters joined in the chanting.

The dissidents then announced the creation of a national forum to promote ``a nonviolent political transition to democracy'' on the island.

In a press release, they urged the government leaders who will attend an Ibero-American summit in Havana in November to press President Fidel Castro for concessions.

``They should ask President Castro to respect the people's self-determination. The people don't want a dictatorship,'' said Joaquin Martinez of the National Civic Union.

Full-time participants in the fast were members of the opposition groups Lawton Foundation for Human Rights, Marti Civic League, Political Prisoners' Coordinating Unit, November 30 Democratic Party and National Civic League.

One of the organizers, Lawton Foundation President Oscar Elias Biscet, told reporters that the fast's greatest achievement had been ``the unity of opposition groups that support civic struggle by nonviolent means.''

Participants in the protest said they had kept ``a rigorous fast, for all to see'' since June 7, in a small apartment in the Havana neighborhood of Santos Suarez.

``Everyone who has come here has ascertained that we've consumed only liquids and vitamins for these past 40 days,'' Biscet said. The number of days is the same as the number of years Castro has been in power.

Many supporters

A report drafted by the dissidents said 2,093 people visited the apartment ``to join in the fast or offer their support.'' The report also said 42 opposition groups in other cities staged sympathy fasts.

The purpose of the fast, Biscet said, ``was not to lose weight or to chat. It was a fast to protest against the violation of human rights in Cuba and to demand the release of political prisoners.''

According to the Political Prisoners' Coordinating Unit, 425 people are held in Cuban prisons for political reasons; 192 of them are also conscientious objectors who refuse to carry out military service.

Biscet said Cuban authorities ``did not assault us directly -- they only cut off the electricity in this building -- but they did mistreat many of our visitors.''

He said he had learned that several people who had joined in the fast ``in solidarity'' elsewhere had been arrested.

Ongoing protests

The activists said they will fast one day every month, as a form of protest, and that they have called for a national forum to promote a transition to democracy. Biscet said the forum would be called the Single Opposition Front.

The forum already includes the dissident organizations Naturpaz, National Civic League, November 30 Democratic Party, Marti Civic League and the Alternative Option Movement, Biscet said.

According to the activists, one purpose of the fast was to create in Cuba ``a minimal capability of stewardship that -- in the near future and within the framework of civil disobedience -- will create a solid, unified structure encompassing all the opposition groups.''

However, they said, that task will be ``very arduous and difficult. We think that a minimal organization already has, in fact, been created and we believe that we can develop it in the future.''

They also stated that ``the mission of the [Cuban] exile groups is to support the decisions we make'' and added that those groups should not ``interfere in the decision-making processes of this forum.''

Anniversary of arrests

The end of the fast coincided with the second anniversary of the arrest of four prominent political dissidents: Vladimiro Roca, Martha Beatriz Roque, Rene Gomez Manzano and Felix Bonne.

Relatives told reporters that the four were planning to fast all day Friday to express their solidarity with the Santos Suarez group.

The four dissidents were tried behind closed doors March 1 on charges stemming from their publication of a document attacking the Cuban Communist Party's monopoly on power, titled The Homeland Belongs to Us All.

Roca was sentenced to five years, Gomez and Bonne to four, and Roque to 3 1/2.

Albright hails dissidents

In a statement issued Friday in Washington, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright hailed the ``sacrifice'' of the four imprisoned dissidents.

``These four Cuban patriots were detained, without being tried for more than a year, under subhuman conditions and sentenced early this year to long prison terms,'' Albright wrote in a message to the Miami offices of the Domestic Dissidence Working Group, the organization the four prisoners founded.

``The world is watching their sacrifice. In March, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights approved a resolution to condemn the repression of human rights being conducted by the Cuban government,'' Albright wrote.

``That resolution gained unprecedented support from the democratic governments in the hemisphere. Democratic nations worldwide are increasing their pressure on the Cuban government to grant the people their basic freedoms,'' she wrote.

Clinton suspends implementation

Also on Friday, President Clinton again suspended the implementation of Title III of the Helms-Burton Act, which allows suits to be brought against companies that do business in Cuba using property confiscated from U.S. companies or U.S. citizens.

Clinton has repeatedly suspended implementation of that segment of the Helms-Burton Act, which tightened the U.S. embargo against Cuba in March 1996.