From April 10 to May 20, 1922, representatives of 29 states and 5 British dominions attended the Genoa Conference in Italy.

The Russian delegation in Genoa represented interests not only of the RSFSR, but also the Soviet republics: Armenian, Belarusian, Georgian, Ukrainian and others. Vladimir Lenin was appointed chairman, and Georgy Chicherin was appointed his deputy.

The grand opening of the event took place in the old palace of San Giorgio. On the very first evening, a member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs was granted the right to take the podium with a report.

Georgy Chicherin began his speech “at the center of world attention” with a conciliatory explanation:

The hereditary nobleman and a talented diplomat was well aware of the importance of the meeting on political issues for the government of the RSFSR, which did not have international recognition. Therefore, in the silence that reigned, he clearly marked the place of his homeland in the economic arena: “The problem of restoring the world economy under current conditions is so immeasurable and extensive that it can be resolved only with a sincere desire to coordinate their actions on the part of all European and non-European countries and with their readiness to make temporary sacrifices, if needed. The economic recovery of Russia as the largest country in Europe with innumerable reserves of natural resources is a sine qua non condition for overall economic recovery. Russia, for its part, declares its full readiness to assist in solving the task of the conference with all means at its disposal, and these means are not small.”

For maximum effect, the outstanding polyglot repeated the speech for the audience 3 times: in Italian, French and English. At the end of his monologue, guests from all over the world began to loudly applaud.

It is worth saying that during the Genoa Conference it was not possible to solve many urgent problems, so some of them were postponed to the Hague Conference in the same year.