Cuba's clampdown Thursday on telephone links with the United States hit islanders the hardest, with Cubans abroad reporting surprisingly few problems with their calls to the island.

Havana residents reported that about half of their direct-dial calls to the United States were not going through and that local telephone operators were advising them of 30-minute delays in operator-assisted calls.

The number that Cubans dial in Havana to make collect calls to the United States, 66-1212, appeared blocked. Public phones that accept calling cards sold in Cuba for U.S. dollars were working, however.

U.S. officials said the U.S. diplomatic mission in Havana also reported that about half of its calls to the United States were not getting through and that its lines were ``congested but working.''

``This is a surprise, because everyone always expected that you people calling in would be the hardest hit,'' said a Latin American journalist in Havana who had been trying to call his newspaper for an hour.

Cardenal Jaime Ortega, Roman Catholic archbishop of Havana, lamented the restrictions on U.S.-Cuba communications without placing blame. ``I am very sorry, because it will be a problem communicating now,'' he said.

Special lines

Before the crackdown, people in Cuba could direct-dial the United States if they had one of the special lines, payable in U.S. dollars, that begin with the prefix 33 or 24.

U.S. telephone company officials reported only minor delays in making calls from the United States to the island and said they hoped even those problems would be resolved before long.

``There's been some degradation and congestion, but we're working on those, and it should get better in coming days,'' said Gustavo Alfonso, Miami spokesman for AT&T, largest of the five U.S. firms affected by the cutoff.

Alfonso said the calls were moving through ``alternate routes'' -- third countries -- and announced that AT&T planned to keep the same prices for calls to Cuba.

MCI WorldCom said its clients' calls ``are going through normally . . . with some delays but nothing significant.''

``It has been less than the worst-case scenario we had feared,'' spokesman Manuel Wernicky said.

Officials of AT&T and other telephone companies said the congestion and delays might get worse during high-calling periods like weekends and holidays.

Middle man

U.S. firms will pay the third countries for routing the calls to Cuba, and the third countries will pay Cuba's ETECSA telephone company for the local connection charges inside Cuba, industry experts said.

Cuba cut off all direct dial circuits owned by AT&T, MCI WorldCom, WilTel, LDDS and IDB at 12:01 a.m. Thursday because they obeyed the orders of U.S. District Court Judge James Lawrence King to freeze payments owed to ETECSA.

King fined the Cuban government and air force $187 million for the deaths of three Miami-based Brothers to the Rescue pilots shot down by the Cuban air force in 1996. The judge has since been seeking ways to allow relatives of the victims to collect on his judgment.

Lawyers for the relatives said they expect King to rule as early as Monday on the garnishments against the five U.S. long-distance firms. A ruling against the families would allow the five companies to pay Cuba; a ruling in favor would require the firms to continue withholding the money.

Granma's take

The Cuban Communist Party newspaper Granma, in an article Thursday announcing the cutoff, appeared to support the U.S. firms' argument that Judge King had forced them to hold up the payments.

``A U.S. federal judge, to satisfy the ambitions of a group of exiles living in that country and the search for profits by their lawyers, is trying to deny income'' owed to ETECSA, Granma reported.

The five U.S. firms, ``despite their wishes, could not meet their obligations because that was prohibited by the judge,'' the report said.

Only Sprint and the Puerto Rico-based TLDI paid their debts to the Cuban telephone company on time and were not affected by the cutoff.

Lawyers for the relatives said they served writs of garnishment against the Sprint subsidiary that handles traffic to Cuba, but Sprint officials said they had not received them.

ETECSA is a joint venture of Cuba's government-owned telephone company and Italy's STET telephone company. ETECSA lawyers argue that the firm should not be affected by King's ruling against the Cuban government and air force.

Telephone company officials said the disruptions and delays should diminish if the cutoff continues.

Callers who experience delays will call less, they said, and telecommunications technicians will figure out better and faster ways of switching the calls.