Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi – April 8, 1998

Before noon, Mr. Seyyed Mohammad Khatami, the President, came to my house for Nowruz visits and also to negotiate about the issue of the Tehran mayor's arrest and the issue of Ayatollah Montazeri. He explained his talks with the Leadership, which they had had on Monday night. He had told Ayatollah Khamenei that he did not wish us to negotiate about the mayor's issue, because due to the difference of opinion, the atmosphere of the negotiations would become bitter, but the Leadership had preferred that it be discussed and had said that the judicial apparatus had acted contrary to his opinion in carrying out the arrest, but we are now facing a fait accompli.

Mr. Khatami complained, "Why did you renew the decree of the head of the [Foundation of the Oppressed] for [Mohsen] Rafiq Doost, right at the time of [Morteza Rafiq Doost's] trial, but here you do not take action?" And also, "Why, the day before yesterday, when he wanted to raise the problem with you by telephone before the announcement of the mayor's arrest, you were not willing to speak and the office said to call after five-thirty? The expectation is that the president can call immediately in times of necessity." He gave an explanation of the five-hour negotiation session of the Council of Ministers and that the statements of Mr. Ataollah Mohajerani, the government spokesperson, were somewhat different from the summary of the session and were sharper, and that the behavior of the officers with the managers of the Tehran municipality was outside judicial and human standards. The Leadership was also dissatisfied with the government's treatment and especially with Mr. Mohajerani's remarks and considers it a cause of division and strife, but he expressed more affection than in previous sessions and took him to his library. Regarding Ayatollah Montazeri too, permission for visiting beyond the same previous three persons—Messrs. Ebrahim Amini, Mohammad Momen, and Seyyed Hassan Taheri Khorramabadi—has not yet been given. Overall, he had not achieved a result from his session with the Leadership.

But this morning, he had been called from the Leader's office to participate at night in the banquet meeting that they are having for the heads of the three branches and me—the head of the Expediency Discernment Council—which is for creating coordination between the three branches and is among the duties of the Leadership. He asked me to definitely come if it is held, and sought my consultative opinion. Before noon, Mr. Seyyed Ali Asghar Hejazi from the Leader's office called and asked me to participate in the Leadership's dinner; I accepted.

At noon Yaser and Mehdi and their children were gathered. The discussion of the sessions, usually these days, is the issue of the Tehran mayor. In the afternoon Fati came and said that she had spoken by telephone with Mr. Ali Razini, the Head of the Judiciary of Tehran, and had criticized the manner of pressure on Karbaschi and had arranged a meeting for his family. Most of today's time passed with the final revision of the record and memoirs of the year 1981 [= Passing Through the Crisis] for publication.

After the evening prayer I went to the Leader's office. Messrs. Seyyed Mohammad Khatami, the President; Ali Akbar Nateq Nouri, the Speaker of the Parliament; and Mohammad Yazdi, the Head of the Judiciary, also arrived. Ayatollah Khamenei, without referring to the issue of the Tehran municipality and the difference between the judicial and executive branches and the unfavorable atmosphere of the press and society, said that they want to carry out the duty of creating coordination between the branches. The meeting is friendly, and they said, "You express your opinions," and specified that they were not satisfied with the arrest of Mr. Gholamhossein Karbaschi, the mayor of Tehran, at this stage.

To soften the atmosphere of the meeting, I referred to a joke that the late Yahya Kalantari made with Sheikh Mohammad Hashemian in the year of their father's death, and after hearing the preacher's praises at the funeral ceremony for the uncle and Sheikh Mohammad, he said that Sheikh Mohammad likes to have several fathers and one to die every week and this ceremony to be repeated; I said, "It would be good for Mr. Yazdi to arrest the managers repeatedly so that we have these friendly banquets!"

Then Mr. Yazdi spoke and said that in the last meeting with the Leadership, he had understood from his remarks permission for the arrest, and Mr. Hejazi had also confirmed the same after the meeting, and later no one had communicated the contrary, and action had been taken according to the law, and the preference is also that we let the law be implemented, and it was not expected that the government would oppose the implementation of the law; with the slogans of legalism that are raised these days.

Mr. Khatami said that in the course of pursuing the issues of the Tehran municipality, the law has been violated; the Leadership referred the issue of the towers and the judiciary addressed other issues. The authority for arrest and interrogation was not the judicial officer, and the method of interrogation was contrary [to the law], and the interpretation of embezzlement was done incorrectly, and the government, with many problems, is forced to enter into that issue.

I said, "The gentlemen did not offer a solution. It would be good for the Leadership to either settle it themselves or assign the heads of the three branches the mission to solve the problem. The issue has currently gone beyond the level of a judicial issue and has also taken on political, security, and social aspects."

Mr. Nateq Nouri, the Speaker of the Parliament, emphasized the observance of the law, and after short remarks by Messrs. Yazdi and Khatami, the Leadership summarized and said: "I entrust the matter to the heads of the three branches, and Mr. Hashemi must also be in the meeting, and I also announce this: that calm be created in society." Then we had dinner and came home. On the way, Mr. Khatami was in my car and we spoke about the quality of the future work.