Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi – March 21, 1997

We were in Kish. The time passed by resting and studying and visiting different parts of the island. In the reports, the negotiations [Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin], the presidents of the United States and Russia in Helsinki [Finland] are of interest. The center of it is the expansion of NATO [to Eastern Europe], which Russia is opposed to and it is unlikely that they will reach an agreement; Interestingly, the Russian media and personalities encourage their government that, in contrast to this expansionist policy of the West, Russia should prioritize the cooperation of Iran, India, and China and go to the limit of the military agreement in this cooperation, and Iran's role in this has become important for the West and Russia. As usual, in the past, we have been leaning towards the West and now we have an independent policy.

Another interesting news is the banning of Nowruz festivities in Afghanistan by the Taliban. Although it is widely implemented in Central Asian countries, Türkiye and northern Iraq; Even Ms. [Tanso] Çiller, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Türkiye, has traveled to the southeast of Türkiye to participate in the Nowruz celebrations that the Kurds want the most, which is to attract the opinions of the Kurds.

A group of clerks and managers [of the Free Zone Organization] of Kish came to visit Eid. I also gave them five hundred tomans. The photographer came and took some pictures of my private life on the beach and... Fazeh came. He complained about the lack of attention Mr. [Mustafa] Hashemi Taba, [the head of the physical education organization] paid to women's sports and asked about the quality of dealing with the cancellation of the international women's sports competitions in Islamic countries in Pakistan.

We went to visit an interesting sweet water dispenser that Mr. [Hossein] Thabit has imported for his big hotel and wants to build; It costs about two hundred thousand dollars. It is installed in a container and produces 380 cubic meters of fresh water daily. I think it can be used in the islands of Iran. For every cubic meter of water, it consumes only four kilowatts of electricity. We saw the plan to plant large palm trees brought from Minab. Mr. Thabit has invested in the field of tourism in the Canary Islands and is successful. He explained about the islands, they attract six million tourists a year, and with four thousand hotel beds, it has 75 thousand passengers a year. He came to build a 600-room five-star hotel on Kish Island. Then we visited an innovative example of using solar energy and sea waves to produce electricity and sweeten water.