Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi – February 9, 1997

[In the morning, we went to the Museum of Contemporary Arts to open the first international festival of calligraphers of the Islamic world. Calligraphers presented me with calligraphy as a reward for my service. I talked to them about the importance of art and the value of calligraphy. ] Mr. [Ali] Aghamohammadi, [head of the Iraq Committee] came. He had suggestions about Iran's plan of 1400 Islamic civilizations, as well as poverty alleviation and other issues, and he criticized the performance of the Program and Budget Organization, which, under the management of [Mohammed Ali] Najafi, did something for Islamic civilization. [Mr. Mohammad Keshavarz], our new ambassador in Venezuela, came to consult and say goodbye. Mr. [Mohsen] Nurbakhsh, [CEO of Central Bank] came. The report of the trip to Switzerland for the [World Economic Forum, in the city of] Davos gave a good answer to Mr. [Siros] Nasseri to the Congress and the speaker of the US House of Representatives, and it was discussed about the provision of foreign currency for the large projects of the oil and gas sector, as well as the rial of the metro and the [presidential] election.

In the evening and at night, the Supreme Council of National Security had a meeting. A decision was made about the threat of America and the issues of Afghanistan and the problem of our embassy in Türkiye and the [Faraj] Sarkohi issue. Ayatollah Khamenei has not announced today as the end of Ramadan due to the lack of sighting of the crescent moon, but Mr. [Mohammed] Fadel Lankarani and [Hussein] Nouri Hamedani in Qom and some Sunni scholars in the west of the country have announced Eid al-Fitr, which is a sign of disorder. I reminded Mr. Mirzadeh about the reform of the study process of the Islamic civilization plan.