ABSTRACT: After 30 years, it is humanly impossible to ascertain whether a person is "really repentant"; those who reason this way are simply paving the way for that which they claim to judge.

(IL MATTINO, 16 July 1980)

On the papeprs I read that today a court of the Republic will once again be called to decide whether to release or not Reder (1). I hope this situation of hallucinating and dangerous blindness will cease to exist: it is impossible, in the name of the martyrs of the Resistance, of their human and civil ideals, to advocate the confirmation of a barbaric vision of law and of punishment.

It is humanly impossible, after over 30 years of "good conduct" (in itself already a ghastly concept) to ascertain whether or not, in the deepest part of his conscience, a human being is or not "truly repentant". Those who prattle about humanity, justice, rule of law, amnesties, antifascism, and who remain silent in the face of this demonization, exorcism, violence, ancestral totems and taboos, and possibly even try to dignify them by recalling the purest part of our history, are simply paving the way for that which they claim to judge and thus condemn. It will take a lot of human courage, of civil courage and of morality to counter this senseless moralism to achieve justice. That is my hope.

Translator's notes

(1) Reder: Nazi criminal of war, responsible for the massacre of Marzabotto in Italy.