ROMA (ITALPRESS) – “ Senator Fulbright is a figure of extraordinary importance in the history of international relations. Not only did he place peace at the heart of his action” and “the proposal of the program” but “it was a great strategist of foreign policy”. Thus the president of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, during the meeting with the director of the Fulbright commission at the Quirinale. “I believe that alongside this goal, Fulbright had another closely connected with that of peace to be pursued: that of understanding that to realize a widespread influence” which “produces, which also determines a preminence in international life, is born not from confrontation, from impositions, but from involvement, first of all cultural and scientific”. For Mattarella “this fabric of knowledge, common commitments of research, studies, among thousands and thousands of talented young people in recent decades has been an element of extraordinary importance in international relations” and “in bilateral relations between the United States and Italy”, but “also in the world balance and the role of the West”.
“From 1948”, Mattarella recalled, “numerous young Italians” used the program and “of these a very high number has played decisive roles in political and institutional life, in Italian culture and economy, in Italian society. And this has been an additional element of sharing life with the United States, of common values expressed, realized and poured into international relations,” the President concludes, wishing “to students who use this program I address the most intense wishes. They gather a tradition of great importance, but they collect it, of course, like every generation, with their own sensibilities and characteristics, which make them protagonists of the present and future”.
– photo Quirinale –
(ITALPRESS).
