Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi – July 14, 1981

I wrote the two days of delayed diary entries first thing in the morning. Then I went to the Majlis. We had an open session. The discussion concerned the budget bill. We were making good progress. There was an open session both in the morning and afternoon.

In the afternoon, the South Korean ambassador came to say farewell and brought a letter from the Speaker of the South Korean Parliament, inviting me to visit South Korea.

Recently, our Foreign Ministry had downgraded the South Korean Embassy to the level of chargé d’affaires. The ambassador was very upset and asked the reason. I said: the espionage activities of several embassy members, the establishment of relations between Korea and Iraq while we were at war with Iraq, and their refusal to sell us weapons after having invited an Iranian delegation to Korea to discuss arms sales. It was agreed that he would contact his government and try to resolve the causes of the strained relations. He asked that economic relations not be reduced.

A group from the Air Force came and made suggestions for replacing the personnel of the Air Force headquarters after Colonel [Javad] Fakouri, who would probably lose his position as Air Force commander in order to take the post of Minister [of Defense], since the Constitution does not allow two positions to be held simultaneously.

I gave a press and radio-television interview about the elections, the parties bill, opposition representatives, and an analysis of the country’s current affairs. Messrs. Rajai, Mousavi-Ardabili, and Behzad Nabavi were my guests for iftar at the Majlis. The Temporary Presidential Council held a meeting in my office. We discussed the current situation, the fight against the armed groups, improving the propaganda concerning them, the managers of IRIB following the resignation of Mr. [Ali] Larijani and his colleagues, as well as the next Prime Minister. We gave a report on the war situation. For the next Prime Ministership, we leaned more toward Mr. Bahonar, and for the head of IRIB, we considered Mr. [Gholam-Ali] Haddad-Adel.

I spent the night in my office and had suhoor there as well. Ahmad Agha called and expressed concern about the condition of Tehran’s water supply, which had recently been repeatedly cut off and restored, and suspected that there might be malicious intent behind it. It was decided that the matter should be followed up.