Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi – August 22, 1997

I was at home. More time was spent studying: The key to the Quran and America's global strategy. In the reports, the debate on the approval of Mr. Khatami's cabinet in the parliament is of interest, and it was far from expected.

Before noon, Mr. [Abdullah] Nouri, the Minister of Interior, came. requests that Mohsen accept his political deputy; I did not accept because Mohsen himself does not agree. He believes that the right wing also tried to drop three people from the cabinet - himself, [Ataullah] Mohajerani and [Ali] Abdul Alizadeh - and failed, and at the next stage [Hossein] Muzafar, [Ishaq] Jahangiri and [Isa] Kalantari, and said that they had published the list of four negative members in the parliament, but in the end, with the reference of the leadership office, they removed Muzafar from the list, and he said, they arranged for the opposition to speak at the end. And if the turn of some of them had come earlier, they would have spoken as if they were in agreement, leaving time for opposition.

He said that he firmly opposes the continued work of Mr. Hedayat [Police Commander Lotfian] and [Mohammed Reza] Naqdi, [Commander of Security and Intelligence] in the police force. He asked me to enter the parliament. He suggested that he accompany me in the mountain climbing program. He claims that the [leadership] agreed to his presence and the immigrants in the cabinet on the basis that they thought they would not vote in the parliament, and he believes that now the right wing has come to the conclusion that it would be better if they changed the constitution in order for me to stay, and they have realized the validity of their proposal and Mr. [Hasan] Rouhani and Mr. [Hussein] Marashi in this regard. He said, Mr. Khatami would like to come here today.

In the evening Mr. Khatami, the president came. After the news of Mr. [Abdullah] Nouri, I suggested that I go to see him, because he has just moved to a new house in our neighborhood [in Jamaran]. He preferred that he come. He defined the course of the debates in the parliament. It is happy to be approved by the full cabinet. He talked about his talks with Ayatollah Khamenei about the Ministry of Information and the leadership office's efforts to have Mr. [Ali] Younisi or [Ali] Razini and he said that the continuation of Mr. [Reza] Amrollahi's work, [head of the Atomic Energy Organization] has not been agreed upon, and to find a replacement, it has been decided to keep Dr. [Hassan] Rouhani in the secretariat of the Supreme National Security Council. Some people are worried that Dr. [Ali Akbar] Velayati will become the secretary of the forum. I emphasized on the continuation of heavy water construction project. He said that the leadership did not accept his proposal to establish a consultative body by combining all the ministers after the revolution due to the presence of unreliable people among them.

Today, the nurses - Fatima and Siddiqa - were here and both are sick; Tahereh is also sick.