p I have been accorded the honour of chairing the concluding session of our Meeting, upon which devolves such tremendous responsibility to our Parties and peoples, the international working class and the world revolutionary movement. I believe brief concluding remarks are therefore in order.

p First of all, on behalf of all present I wish to thank the Soviet and Hungarian Parties for their contribution to the sagacious and dedicated work, in a spirit of communist comradeship, which facilitated the success of the Meeting. I also wish to thank the political and technical personnel who efficiently served the Meeting, working devotedly and without rest. Personnel from the CPSU and from the HSWP when we met in Budapest, were enlisted for this task.

p It is hard, comrades, to deliver a speech at this closing sitting. First, because despite long years of work in the communist movement, at this moment we feel the same emotions as filled our hearts in the young years when we were only joining its ranks. Second, it is superfluous, I think, to indulge in florid and solemn speeches at this forum of leaders of the international communist movement. The most noble words fade before our responsibility to history, the world revolutionary process, the fight to refashion society, begun at a time when the great Lenin led the Bolsheviks in storming the Winter Palace. Our movement’s supreme historic achievements and heroism speak for themselves.

p I will not be exaggerating when I say that all of us are fully aware of the significance of the moment. For we are laying the cornerstone of a great edifice: unity of the international communist movement for fulfilment of its historic tasks at this new stage. We are laying the foundation of universal unity of our movement, unity of Communists who, in Lenin’s words, represent the mind, honour and conscience of our epoch.

p This Meeting has proved that unity is possible, that it accords with our principles and is crucial to the great victories of the future. And I should like to think that as we are concluding it we are asserting the historical continuity of the Leninist doctrine, translating into life the great behests of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. He enjoined us unswervingly to abide by Marxism-Leninism and safeguard its purity, but also creatively to approach the new phenomena of our time. He demanded the communist organisation, fraternal unity; courage and 678 perseverance needed to lay siege to the fortress of imperialism and advance the cause of the international .socialist revolution.

p Comrades, we are meeting in the land of Leninism, the continuation of Marxism. We are gathered in the Kremlin, where the great Lenin worked, and very close to his Mausoleum.

p And this, enhances still more our appreciation of his immortal ideas, which fire people’s hearts, energise our movement, clarify our thoughts and summon us to a h’fe-and-death struggle, and fortify the will to victory of millions in the Soviet Union and throughout our splendid movement.

p Neither difficulties, nor crises, nor sacrifices can dislodge our movement from the decisive place it holds in modern history.

p We know that our Parties are capable of continuing Lenin’s cause, of giving leadership to the peoples, uniting the whole international revolutionary and anti-imperialist movement, all democratic and progressive forces, in the fight for peace, democracy and national liberation.

p In this closing quarter of the 20th century—which since October 1917 has rightly come to be known as the age of communism—mankind’s future depends, above all, on the activity of our Parties in expanding and carrying forward the socialist revolution.

p We see communist unity in its historical development, enriched here by democratic, constructive, sincere and frank discussion, without diplomacy and unnecessary ritual. It needs communist minds and hearts to accomplish the great task history has entrusted to us. And we are confident that millions look with hope to Moscow, to our Meeting. For the life of the peoples, their opportunity for emancipation, depend to a considerable degree upon our unity. And the peoples have followed with hope the work of our Meeting and will properly assess its results. For they are prepared to shed their blood, give their lives, in the struggle, and because they measure our work in terms of how much nearer it brings them to realisation of their dreams. During the Meeting we received heartening news, for instance, of the Provisional Revolutionary Government formed by the people of South Vietnam, but also news of tragic events, notably of the dastardly murder by the dictatorial regime of many members of the Central Committee of the United Party of Haitian Communists. We received 14,000 letters and telegrams from Soviet people, builders of communism, who have keenly followed our Meeting, in which they see a part of their own great endeavour.

p Our work should be assessed not only in its narrow implications, nor even against the historical background of our cause—it should be regarded also from the standpoint of the living and pressing realities that confront millions; from the standpoint of their concerns, their blood, anguish and hopes—but also their confidence in victory. In the socialist countries our work will be appraised in the light of its contribution to building and defending the new society, assistance to the anti-imperialist movement, and the education of the new type of man. Our work will be appreciated in the USSR and the other socialist countries, in countries directly menaced by imperialism (Cuba, Vietnam, GDR), in the heart of Africa, in Asia and in my own Latin America, shaken by crises and held in US imperialist bondage. I think the discussion has enabled us to 679 produce a Document that reflects the revolutionary dynamism of world development, the achievements and mistakes of our Parties. And we feel sure that, having surmounted the big difficulties before us, and having held this Meeting, we are more united than ever, richer for the ideas expounded in the general debate, and more confident in the triumph of our cause. We are working to make unity the fundamental factor in the success of the anti-imperialist struggle, in thwarting the aggressive plans of imperialism, particularly US imperialism, and in advancing the cause of freedom and socialism. Observance of the coming centenary of the great Lenin—in the inspiring atmosphere of the very building where Lenin worked—is a fitting consummation of our work.

Fermit me to salute the final triumph of our cause and our unity, the condition for that triumph; permit me to salute proletarian internationalism and MarxismLeninism! (Applause.)