Akbar Hashemi's Memoirs - March 28, 2000 - Report by General Hossein Alaei on the Interrogation of the Accused in the Saeed Hajjarian Assassination Attempt

Continuation of Akbar Hashemi’s New Year Visits.

Report by General Hossein Alaei on the interrogation of the accused in the assassination attempt on Saeed Hajjarian and the opposition of Sheikh Ali Younesi to the conclusions.

Proposal for targeted propaganda by Ali Aghamohammadi, then Deputy Political Director of IRIB.

The most important note of today was Akbar Hashemi’s private meeting with Ayatollah Khamenei, where the Supreme Leader, upon arrival, expressed his displeasure over the Ministry of Intelligence’s lack of action against figures like Akbar Ganji. Khamenei informed Ali Younesi of his frustration, expressing dissatisfaction with the behavior of Gholamhossein Karbaschi, who, after being pardoned, had resumed writing even more daring reformist content in the Ham-Mihan newspaper.

Now, after many years, even though Akbar Hashemi’s writings have been somewhat tempered, one can understand the underlying reasons for numerous judicial strictnesses and bureaucratic delays. These patterns, seen in issues such as automotive imports, reflect the broader systemic challenges, including the removal of Sheikh Ali Bakhshi, the former Chief Judge of the Appeals Court handling Akbar Ganji's case. Bakhshi had overturned Ganji's heavy sentence from the lower court, reducing it to a lighter prison term, but the judiciary of Tehran and higher judicial officials quickly annulled that ruling in the Supreme Court, issuing a revised sentence.

Most of today was spent on New Year visits, during which questions about various national issues were also raised.

Mr. Hossein Alaei, Chief of the Joint Staff of the IRGC, reported that he had personally interviewed each of the suspects involved in the assassination attempt on Mr. Saeed Hajjarian while they were in IRGC custody. All of them had confessed to their roles and defended their actions. Three of them were politically inclined towards the leftist movement and had campaigned for them in recent elections. Given the role of one of them, Mohammad Ali Moghadami, in helping transport Mr. Hajjarian to the hospital, serious doubts about their original intentions have arisen. However, Mr. Ali Younesi, Minister of Intelligence, disagrees with this conclusion, suggesting the possibility that another person could have been the shooter. Younesi mentioned that initial investigations by the Ministry had identified another suspect who is currently in custody, and he argues that the IRGC did not discover these individuals but that two of them had turned themselves in.

Mr. Ali Aghamohammadi, Deputy Political Director of IRIB, proposed forming a committee to coordinate media propaganda in response to the leftists and liberals, with an aggressive stance similar to how their opponents operate. I slept in my office that night.

In the evening, I was a guest of Ayatollah Khamenei. When he entered, he seemed somewhat agitated, stating that after prayers, he had expressed frustration with Mr. Ali Younesi, the Minister of Intelligence, for failing to take action against troublesome figures in the press, such as Akbar Ganji. He did not accept Younesi's excuse that the judiciary was uncooperative. The Supreme Leader also expressed dissatisfaction with Mr. Gholamhossein Karbaschi for the content he had been publishing in Ham-Mihan newspaper.

We also discussed the state of the press and strategies for reform. In addition, we talked about the trial of Mr. Saeed Hajjarian’s attackers. The leftists are pushing for a delay in the trial. Dr. Hassan Habibi, the First Vice President, asked me today to help with the postponement. It seems they favor the delay for political purposes and to keep ambiguities alive, while the judiciary seeks to expedite the trial. We also discussed the ongoing disputes within OPEC and the threat of falling oil prices.

The majority of OPEC members, under pressure from the U.S., favor increasing production.