We are dismayed at this death because of the void that Joseph Stalin leaves in his people and in humanity as a whole. Gentlemen, if you abandon your … - Sandro Pertini

He ended his day well, though too early for us and for the fate of the world. His last word was one of peace. Well, at this hour that is so sad for us, we hope that this call for peace, which reflects the will of all the workers of the earth, will not fall on deaf ears, but will be taken up by all those who hold the fate of peoples in their hands.

Well, neofascists who once again stand in the shadows and listen, I boast that I ordered the execution of Mussolini, because I and the others did nothing more than sign a death sentence pronounced by the Italian people twenty years earlier.

The fate of the Italian working people was as close to Joseph Stalin's heart as the fate of his own people and that of all the peoples of the earth. He always fought for peace, aware that those who pay the highest tribute of blood and suffering, in war, are his peasants and workers. And as a good socialist, he knew that one should not want war in order to destroy what the present society has built, but should strive to transform the old society in order to build a new one. This was his firm will; this is what he fought for in his later years. He has always rejected any provocation, he has always renounced acts of force in order to defend this good that belongs not only to his people, but to all mankind.