Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi – April 8, 1990

I reached my office at half past eight in the morning. Mr. [Mohsen] Noorbakhsh, [Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance] came. He spoke about currency policy and economic issues and said about the necessity of political measures to facilitate the sale of oil. Currently, we have a kind of boycott and restriction that we cannot sell oil easily; Most of the violations are from America and England.

Mr. Ali Hojjati [Kermani] came. He said that he believed that our positions were correct, otherwise the revolution would have gone astray. He demanded more attention and the possibility to work more for the revolution. He brought the message of Mr. Seyyed Reza Sadr, who wanted to release Ayatollah Qomi. undertakes not to disturb.

[Oil Minister] Mr. [Gholamreza] Aghazadeh came. He gave the news of the progress of the phosphate fertilizer production plant and stressed the urgency of extracting phosphate from the mines and asked me to go to Shiraz to open the methanol plant. I said that I have a plan to travel to Fars. He plans to make several trips to sell oil.

Mr. [Javad] Maghsoodi came from the headquarters [of conducting] Friday prayers [Tehran]. He criticized some of the radicals and statements of Mr. [Mahdi] Karroubi during the ceremony on April 12, [Islamic Republic Day] and explained about putting a temporary roof on the lawn of Tehran University for Friday prayers; I said it should not be expensive. He demanded the appointment of a board of directors for the construction of the mosque.

The officials of the research [and consulting] center of Tehran University came. They reported and I encouraged academic research to be coordinated with executive needs. In the evening, I attended the meeting of the government board. Qeshm Island was approved as a free zone to operate with a policy-making council. We decided to announce the news after making the necessary predictions in order to prevent abuses in land encroachment.

I had a fever and after the session I also had chills. I came to my office with a fever. Dr. [Hadi] Manafi, [the head of the medical system organization] came; He injected the ampoule and gave medicine. I stayed in my office at night. I canceled the meeting with the leader.