Akbar Hashemi's Memoirs - December 17, 2002

Last night and today, it snowed heavily in many parts of the country, including Tehran. At eight in the morning, we went to the [Martyr] Kolahdouz Hall in the IRGC headquarters to open the conference of the IRGC’s combat and construction engineers. There were also some from the [construction] Jihad and the army; about three thousand people. It was a magnificent meeting. Mr. Rahim Safavi, [Commander-in-Chief of the IRGC], gave a good speech. I also gave a detailed speech about the IRGC, defense, construction and military engineering, and the current situation in Iraq and the United States.

We had a meeting with the deputies of the Strategic Research Center [the Expediency Discernment Council]. The discussions were about the results of the Iraqi opposition conference and the possibility of an American attack on Iraq and its effects. The opposition has determined the composition of the committee with 55 percent Shiites and the rest Kurds and Sunnis.

In the afternoon, a group of Qomi residents in the center came to the meeting, who are working to develop Qom. Mr. [Mohammad Reza] Vafaei, [the secretary general of the Qomi residents in Tehran], gave a report, and I spoke about Qom’s entitlement to more attention.

The United States has condensed the 12,000-page report on Iraq into 3,000 pages to give to the other members of the [UN] Security Council. They had previously said it was 24,000 pages; Iran should try to get a copy of it. [Colin Powell], the US Secretary of State, has explicitly stated that US policy is to intervene in the dramas of Middle Eastern countries to bring about fundamental changes, mainly through the media.

The United States has begun deploying anti-missile missiles in the western United States and Alaska and has asked Britain and Denmark to also deploy such bases so that they can protect the eastern United States. Russia and China have strongly protested this decision by the United States, believing that this action will intensify the arms race.

A group of Iranians who went to the US Immigration Department today to have their fingerprints taken were insulted and some were arrested, causing anger and fear among them.

The United States has once again protested Egypt for broadcasting the anti-Zionist series "The Horseless Horseman" during the month of Ramadan, and some representatives have proposed cutting off American aid to Egypt. A leader of the US Republican Party has said that the policy of racial discrimination is more beneficial to America than the policy of eliminating discrimination against blacks, and this has been strongly protested by freedom and human rights circles. The Etna volcano [in the northeast of the island of Sicily] in Italy has been active for weeks and is causing damage as it progresses.