During the past few months, an effort was already made through initiatives at the Soviet Embassy in Italy and appeals to Gorbaciev himself, to overome the problem (of a burocratic and political nature) of obtaining the necessary visas and passports for various Soviet citizens to be able to take part in the Radical Party's Federal Council. A special effort was made for Eugenia Debrianskaya, member of the Federal Council of the Radical Party elected only second to Marco Pannella at the Budapest Congress. Several other Soviet members of the Radical Party were also invited, the dissidents Grigoriants and Timofeev, and the deputies Afanasiev and Korotich;

Boris Eltsin, leader of the "Radical Democratic Opposition Group" in the Soviet Union, was also urged to intervene for the concession of the passports.

The effort was all in vain, to the point that it became necessary to call off the Federal Council meeting which had been planned for the end of July in Strasburg. The President, Marco Pannella, declared to this end that the Radical Party had had to "give up one of its most important meetings on the institutional and political level, in order to defend the right and the duty of its Soviet members to take part in the Federal Council and to collaborate in its decision making."

It was decided to postpone the Federal Council until early September, and that it should be held in Rome.

Thus in August we embarked on new initiatives, and pressure was exerted on the Soviet authorities. Two Radical spokesmen, Antonio Stango and Marino Busdachin, went to Moscow to try and resolve the issue of expatriot visas on the spot.

The deputies Afanasiev and Korotich, who did not have problems in obtaining authorization, guaranteed their presence at the FC. Once the various burocratic difficulties had been surmounted, all the requests for the issue of passports for the other guests were finally made. But there was not a sign from the authorities confirming their willingness to cooperate.

On August 20, Pannella started a hunger strike: "As a nonviolent, it is my duty to intervene adequately so as to enable the Soviet authorities and President Gorbaciev, if necessary, to remove the obstacles standing in the way of our comrades and guests." With interventions, letters to the papers, and to the Soviet authorities, the "Debrianskaya" case was created in the press, especially in Italy.

The nonviolent association "Liberta e pace", which has over 70 members who have joined the Radical Party, met in Moscow and decided to carry out demonstrations, in Moscow, Leningrad and Riga, to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the "Molotov-Ribbenthrop pacts of blood". The demonstrations were banned by the authorities but nonetheless on the 23rd in Moscow, in Pushkin square, about 2000 people gathered with slogans and bill-boards, to advocate freedom and rights. Many people were arrested by the police, among these were seven Radicals, including Antonio Stango and Eugenia Debrianskaya. In Leningrad too, as well as in Riga, the police were very tough and made arrests, including the radical militants Nicolaj Charmov and Asia Lesciva. They were all tried and condemned to a fortnight in prison, except for the Italian, Stango, who was released as soon as he had been identified, and Debrianskaya, who was heavily fined and released because she had her children to look after.

In the meantime, Vladmir Vanin, the Rome director of the "Novosti" agency, maintained in an open letter to Marco Pannella that visas for the Soviets had already been granted. In actual fact, as Pannella noted in his reply, the necessary authorizations were ready only for Grigoriants and Timofeev, even though the latter had not yet been able to claim them for personal reasons, while for Debrianskaya and the other Radicals the situation remained unchanged.

In the mean time, Stango and Busdachin declared that they would stay in Moscow even though their visas had expired, to watch over the fate of those who had been arrested, and to make sure that the visas were granted. They were however, shortly arrested and forced to take a plane to Rome.

The next day, it was eventually found that a visa had been granted even for Eugenia Debrianskaya, while there was no technical possibility to obtain one for the other two Radical guests, Ekaterina Podolzeva from Leningrad, and Nikolaj Chramov from Moscow.

Since he had achieved his main objective, Pannella decided to suspend his hunger strike.