The memories of Akbar Hashemi - 12 November 2002

  Hossein Marashi said, the right wing approached him to request me to accept responsibility in the future, and he answered that he would not accept so-and-so.

The leadership is not satisfied with the [execution] sentence of Mr. Aghajari, but they do not think it is expedient to express their opinion, which weakens the judiciary.

Full text:

Mr. [Mortaza] Bakhtiari, the head of the [organization of] prisons [and security and educational measures of the country] came. He gave a report on the state of the prisons.  He talked about the lack of space and quality forces, the measures taken to train the administrative force and the police, the implementation of the expediency assessment council's decision to transfer prisons to camps and the construction of camps in Chenaran, Mashhad and Qom Road, and explained how to manage open prisoners who can go out for work.

It is expected that the protests against the [execution] sentence of Mr. [Hashem] Aghajari will continue.  Mr. Hossein Marashi, [the representative of Kerman] came.  He said about the state of the parliament and the mistake in the death sentence of Agha Jari and the use of the left wing and their problem with the decrease in popularity in public opinion.

Mr. [Hossein] Kamali, the former minister of labor [and social affairs] and general director of grain, came. He said, they have bought about nine million tons of wheat this year.  They owe 300 billion tomans, and due to the government's budget deficit, they could not pay, and the more wheat is bought from inside, the more the costs will increase.  It was reported that the extreme left and liberal forces did not vote in the last congress of the Islamic Labor Party.  

I was a guest of the leadership.  They are not satisfied with the [execution] sentence of Mr. Aghajari, but they do not know it is expedient to express their opinion because it weakens the judiciary and to some extent the verdict was issued with the favorable opinion of Mr. Hashemi Shahroudi, [head of the judiciary];  Mr. [Abbas Ali] Alizadeh, the Chief Justice of Tehran, said the same thing yesterday.  They don't think it is expedient to pardon immediately, and they think the correct solution is to amend the verdict in the appeal court, but it is clear that the leftists will take advantage of the appeal.  They don't have a proper way to prevent it.  We also discussed about future issues and general policies.

In theory, the Iraqi parliament opposed Security Council Resolution 1441, but left the decision to Saddam Hussein.  With the situation we know from Iraq, the expectation was the same.

Israel has occupied Tulkarem camp in retaliation for the action of a Palestinian mujahid in a Zionist agricultural town and killed five Israelis and injured 10 others and killed a few-month-old child.  In Kabul, students had a large demonstration against the government, which resulted in 6 deaths, 30 injuries and many arrests.