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Ignazio Silone, born Secondo Tranquilli in the Abruzzi region of Italy on May 1, 1900, was a founding member of the Italian Communist Party (PCI). He changed his name while in a Spanish prison, under arrest for his political activities. Charged with important tasks by the PCI, he traveled to Moscow for a meeting of the Executive Committee of the Communist International in May 1927. There, Joseph Stalin insisted that the EC condemn Leon Trotsky for treason based on a document that Stalin refused to make available to the members of the committee. When Silone naively asked to read the incriminating document, Stalin protested. Silone refused to condemn Trotsky without having seen the evidence, and Stalin insisted that if the motion to condemn was not unanimous, it would be withdrawn. A day later, Silone was astonished to read in the newspapers that the EC of the Comintern had "unanimously" condemned Trotsky. So began a long and painful process of disillusionment that was to end with Silone's expulsion from the Communist Party in 1931.