SAO PAULO — Dilma Rousseff arrives in Cuba on Monday on her first visit there as Brazil's president, and she's facing pressure to take a stronger and more public stance on human rights violations that continue under the Cuban government.

Rousseff meets with Raul Castro on Tuesday.

Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez, a government critic, sought to meet Rousseff. She tried to compare herself to Brazil's leader back when Rousseff was a young Marxist guerrilla jailed and tortured by Brazil's military dictatorship.

Sanchez told Brazilian newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo that after seeing a photo recently of a 22-year-old Rousseff being interrogated by a military court during Brazil's dictatorship, she was moved. "That's how I feel at this moment," Sanchez said.

Cuban dissident groups like Las Damas de Blanco also have requested meetings with Brazil's leader.

Rousseff's administration has sent one signal that it's sympathetic to some of these concerns. Brazil's Foreign Ministry issued a tourist visa last week to Sanchez to travel to Brazil next month to attend the launch of a documentary film in the northern state of Bahia.

Sanchez, however, first needs government authorization to leave Cuba. Rousseff is not planning to lobby on behalf of Sanchez with Castro, nor is she scheduled to meet with Sanchez or other members of opposition groups. The trip's focus is economic relations.

Brazil-Cuba bilateral trade reached a record $642 million in 2011, up 31 percent from 2010.

The Brazilian company Odebrecht is working on construction of the Port of Mariel in Cuba, and Brazil's development bank is financing it.

"We hope that she is interested not just in the state of construction of the Mariel port but the state of construction of citizens' rights in Cuba," Sanchez said.

While applauding some of Rousseff's early moves, many activists from developing countries would like to see greater Brazilian leadership on human rights issues. They range from Iranian democracy activists to Burmese dissidents who are trying to appeal to Brazil and Rousseff's personal story.

For example, Hadi Ghaemi, the executive director of the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, visited Brasilia last February to lobby for support for a resolution at the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva last March to create a special rapporteur to investigate human rights abuses in Iran.

He said that he was warmly received by Foreign Ministry officials and a Rousseff foreign policy adviser, Marco Aurelio Garcia. Brazil ended up supporting the resolution.

Another activist looking to Brazil is Thaung Htun, the representative to the UN for the National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma. He also visited Brasilia and met with officials last year.

He said in an interview that even with recent reforms in his country, much remains to be done there. He also said that his country must be careful to not come across as supported by only the United States and Europe. "We are a developing country, and we want solidarity from countries in the south," he said.

Cuba, however, is a unique case for Brazil. The two countries have regional ties and there's friendship between Cuban government officials and Brazil's Workers Party, to which Rousseff belongs.

Yet for some, this is one reason that Brazil should take a stronger position.