Pope John Paul II, in his most detailed comments on Cuba since his visit last year, urged the government on Thursday to respect human rights and said his church still awaits a ``more generous opening by Havana.

John Paul's unusually lengthy comments, made as the new Cuban ambassador to the Vatican, Isidro Gomez Santos, presented his credentials, underlined the pontiff's continuing strong interest in Cuba, Vatican officials said.

In a 15-paragraph statement to Gomez, the Pope said that while he approved of Cuba's high educational and health standards, its people need more to achieve fulfillment.

John Paul said Cuban society can benefit from ``a climate of detente and trust in which fundamental human rights are safeguarded for believers and nonbelievers.

Such a climate ``would create conditions under which people can act according to their own criteria and make responsible use of their freedoms, not moved by coercion but guided by their conscience, he said.

Vatican officials said John Paul has been disappointed with the meager progress in church-state relations in Cuba since his visit of January 1998, but remains committed to gently prodding instead of confronting the government.

UNUSUAL CONFERENCE

Cuba's church is holding an unusual secular conference this week in Havana -- topic: the church's role in society -- that includes speeches by Vatican Foreign Minister Archbishop Jean Louis Tauran and foreign academics not linked to the church.

John Paul told Gomez that ``limitations of fundamental freedoms [and] the depersonalization and discouragement of individuals leads to ``moral poverty and said his main message during his visit to Cuba had been, ``Don't be afraid.

Recalling one of his most famous phrases during that visit, the pontiff insisted the Cuban people need ``the world's effective and generous opening to Cuba, and Cuba's [opening] to the world.

``This path would be easier if Cuba, in return, provided a new space for freedom and the participation of its people, who have been asked to collaborate in the construction of society, the pontiff told Gomez.

John Paul also said he was aware of Cuba's limited economic resources, but pointedly noted that the church in Cuba ``is still awaiting a still more generous opening to the solidarity offered by the universal church.

ELBOW ROOM

While the church has continued to pump millions of dollars in humanitarian aid to Cuba, it has yet to win any of the elbow room that it has insistently requested from President Fidel Castro.

The church has asked for the right to open religious schools and send in more foreign priests, more access to the government-controlled mass media and the right to operate its own media.