Memoirs of Akbar Hashemi – November 25, 1996

At nine o'clock in the morning, we went to the parliament to present the 1376 budget. Upon entering, the MPs gave a warm welcome. This is the first time that I am going to the official session of the parliament. After welcoming Mr. Natiq [Nuri, speaker of the parliament], who has come to Iran from Turkmenistan for this meeting. He was supposed to go to India from there. He will go to India tomorrow. I started talking. My speech lasted one hour and forty minutes; It was a comprehensive speech. Then I responded to the representatives' inquiries. I worked in my office until the evening. I went to the government meeting. We had several resolutions; including giving concessions to exporters of goods to Africa, similar to the concessions we have given to Central Asian countries.

I was a guest of the leader at dinner. We talked about our issues with Germany and the manner of the response to the letter and verbal message of [Mr. Helmut Kohl], the Chancellor of Germany, and Mr. Engineer [Mirhossein] Mousavi's withdrawal from the presidential candidacy [elections] and the reason for that, and the establishment of the Africa Foundation, which was proposed by me. They agree with the principle of establishing the foundation, but if it is named, they doubt that it will be beneficial. It was discussed about the expropriation of Khorasan province; We decided to do an expert examination. They used to disagree. They talked about the possibility of peace between Azerbaijan and Armenia. According to the news brought by Dr. Habibi, Azeris are ready to give autonomy to Karabakh. It was discussed about my trip to Türkiye, which was agreed. I came home After writing today's diary, as usual every night, I started to prepare Mr. Kohl's reply letter.