Khrushchev Message to Johnson
Moscow TASS International Service in English 0950 GMT 23 November 1963--L
(Text) Moscow--The full text of the condolence message
from Nikita Khrushchev on the death of President Kennedy:
Mr. Lyndon B. Johnson, President of the United States, the
White House, Washington.
I am deeply grieved by the news of the tragic death of the
outstanding statesman, President John Fitzgerald Kennedy of the United States of
America.
The death of J.F. Kennedy is a hard blow to all people who
cherish the cause of peace and Soviet-American cooperation. The heinous
assassination of the U.S. President, at a time when, as a result of the efforts
of peace-loving peoples, there appeared signs of relaxation of international
tension and a prospect has opened for improving relations between the USSR and
the United States, evokes the indignation of the Soviet people against the
perpetrators of this base crime.
I shall remember my personal meetings with President J.F.
Kennedy--a person of broad outlook who realistically assessed the situation and
tried to find new ways for negotiated settlement of international problems which
now divide the world.
The Soviet Government and the Soviet people share the grief
of the American people over this great loss and express the hope that the search
for settling disputable questions, a search in which President J.F. Kennedy made
a tangible contribution, will be continued in the interests of peace, for the
benefit of mankind.
Accept, Mr. President, my personal condolences. Signed: N.
Khrushchev, chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers, the Kremlin, Moscow, 23
November 1963.
(Editor's Note: Moscow in English to Eastern North America at 0119 GMT on 24 November states that the Khrushchev message to Lyndon Johnson on Kennedy's death was "broadcast several times on the domestic service of Radio Moscow and appears in this evening's 23 November edition of the government paper IZVESTIYA.")