Reports that negotiations existed between the State and the Mafia in 1992 continued to spark political polemics in Italy on Monday. The negotiations apparently started in the weeks between the murders of anti-mafia crusading judges Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, who were killed by bombs set by Cosa Nostra in Sicily. The State-Mafia contacts recently leapt into the public spotlight after Massimo Ciancimino, son of former mayor and reputed mafioso Vito Ciancimino, gave prosecutors in Palermo a copy of the conditions Cosa Nostra gave the state for suspending its bloody offensive.

While some politicians have called the 12-point 'wish list' a fake, including ex-Lower House speaker Luciano Violante, others have confirmed that a line of communication was opened with the Cosa Nostra bosses Salvatore Riina and Bernardo Provenzano through Vito Ciancimino and two officials from the Carabinieri ROS special branch, Mario Mori and Giuseppe Di Donno. Massimo Ciancimino on Monday continued his testimony before prosecutors here and is said to have given investigators other documents which belonged to his late father. In reply to Violante's accusation that the list he delivered was a fake, Ciancimino told the press ''I don't want to get into something which is up to the magistrates to decide.

However, what is really disturbing is that there are people who only now remember things of 17 years ago''. The son of the ex-Palermo mayor was apparently referring to Violante who only this year remembered that Vito Ciancimino, through Mori, had asked to meet with him. Violante, a former judge and ex-MP for the center-left, at the time was head of parliament bicameral Anti-Mafia Commission.

JUSTICE MINISTER VOWS TO ASCERTAIN THE TRUTH. Justice Minister Angelino Alfano on Monday said that while he could say nothing on the authenticity of the documents produced by Ciancimino, ''I have full faith in the magistrates to ascertain the truth'' Among those who have confirmed that a line of communication existed between the State and Cosa Nostra are Claudio Martelli, justice minister at the time; Liliana Ferrero, who took Falcone's place at the justice ministry after his murder; and, most recently, Italy's top Anti-Mafia Prosecutor Piero Grasso, who along with Falcone was part of Martelli's team at the justice ministry. In an interview published Sunday by the Turin daily La Stampa, Grasso said that negotiations were successful in avoiding the murders of a number of top Italian politicians, including, Martelli, seven-time premier Giulio Andreotti, Carlo Vizzini and Calogero Mannino. According to Grasso, there was documented evidence that at the time Cosa Nostra had sought to negotiate with the State, that Mori and Di Donno had been in contact with Vito Ciancimino and that Riina and Provenzano had been promised certain benefits and preferred treatment if they turned themselves in. He added that Borsellino's murder would appear to have been an attempt by Cosa Nostra to get more out of the negotiations.

Grasso also said that a list of demands similar to those produced by Massimo Ciancimino had been delivered to Mori and Di Donno. The interview shocked Borsellino's brother Salvatore who on Monday asked: ''How is it possible that such a high-ranking magistrate only now talks about negotiations between the State and the Mafia. And why are all the rest from Martelli to Ferraro to Violante - only talking now. Everyone knew but no one said anything before''.

In regard to the possibility that his brother was killed as a bargaining chip in the negotiations, Borsellino said ''the idea that my brother was a sacrificial lamb in negotiations between the state and the Mafia to save the lives of politicians shocks me''. ''I ask myself why these institutional figures are only talking now, 17 years after the fact. Is it because prosecutors in Palermo and Caltanissetta are getting close to the truth? Those who knew anything had the duty to speak out years ago. This was a moral duty which transcends justice,'' he added.