SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 12

LENGTH: 239 words

HEADLINE: PREZ TO STAND TOUGH ON CUBA EMBARGO

BYLINE: BY KENNETH R. BAZINET

BODY:
WASHINGTON - Ignoring pleas from former President Jimmy Carter and some in his own party, President Bush will reaffirm his support today for the U.S. embargo on Communist Cuba.

The President, in a speech this morning before a trip to Miami, will lay out what Cuban leader Fidel Castro must do before the embargo is eased. Bush's demands include:

Open elections by year's end;

The release of political prisoners;

Reforms away from socialism.

"Without major steps by Cuba to open up its political system and its economic system, trade with Cuba will not help the Cuban people - it will merely enrich Castro and his cronies and prop up their dictatorship," Bush will say, according to excerpts of the speech released last night.

His hard-line stance on Cuba is seen by some as an attempt to shore up Cuban support in Florida this fall, where brother Jeb Bush is looking for a second term as governor.

The President will fly to Miami this afternoon to attend a $25,000-a-head soft money fund-raiser at the home of a Cuban-American real estate developer.

The President's speech comes days after Carter, in an uncensored address in Havana, called for democratic reform and an easing of the embargo.

Some Democrats and Republicans have made the same call.

In China, North Korea and Vietnam, the U.S. allows trade, saying it can bring democracy, said Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) "Yet in Cuba we say the opposite is true."

LOAD-DATE: May 20, 2002