"(In 2021, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party) I was secretary of the Italian Communist Youth, and I was sent by our party secretary, Enrico Berlinguer, to China at the end of 1978. I remember that we were staying at the Beijing Hotel, which was perhaps the largest building in Beijing at the time. I remember the morning rustle of thousands and thousands of bicycles passing through Tiananmen Square, with the occasional car passing by. In a very short period of time, [China] has made an extraordinary leap towards modernity and progress, which will certainly remain the great historical achievement of the Communist Party. I believe that the most important thing China has managed to do is to lift at least 800 million people out of poverty: this is an extraordinary achievement. No country in the history of humanity has ever managed to achieve such an immense transformation in people's lives, in the sense that today China is a country where the scourge of poverty and hunger has been defeated or reduced to a totally marginal phenomenon; and this is an extraordinary historical achievement. Of course, [...] I also appreciate what has happened in recent years, because there has been a significant commitment to changing the Chinese model of development, especially in the sense of a development that is more compatible with the environment, more respectful of the environment, and more attentive to domestic consumption."