From the Controversy of Salary Slips to Cooperation in the Fight Against Money Laundering

The 'second wave of resignations' is the primary description of the Sunday issue of the newspaper Etemad regarding the collective resignation of 'Safdar Hosseini, the head of the National Development Fund and the members of its board.' This newspaper refers to Safdar Hosseini, a former Minister of Economy and Labor in Mohammad Khatami's government and the head of the National Development Fund in Hassan Rouhani's administration, as the 'biggest victim' of the salary slip scandal so far, stating that on Saturday 'all the board of trustees and executive board of the fund gathered in Rouhani's office as the head of the board. They resigned themselves, and the President accepted their resignations.' Etemad continues that 'reports suggest that Safdar Hosseini quickly returned 281 million tomans of a 300 million toman loan with a four percent interest and 200 million tomans of his excess salary to the government treasury.' Etemad mentions Davood Danesh-Jafari, Tahmasb Mazaheri, and Masoud Nili as 'candidates for the new presidency of the National Development Fund' and simultaneously quotes Abbas Abdi, stating that the salary slip issue 'cannot be solved by passing the ball to each other. The only solution is transparency and access to information, including all payments in the administrative system. Every day of delay in this matter adds to the days of administrative corruption.' The newspaper Shargh reported that the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic emphasized 'decisive action against irregular payments' in response to a letter from Eshaq Jahangiri, the first vice president of Hassan Rouhani, stating that 'all agencies must show sensitivity to irregular payments and decisively address violations.' According to this newspaper, Eshaq Jahangiri requested 'cooperation and participation of all public institutions with the government in establishing discipline, especially in financial matters and full compliance with laws and regulations' in a letter to the Supreme Leader on June 15. Shargh simultaneously reported on the criticism of Mohammad Ali Vakili, a member of the tenth parliament's presiding board and a member of the Hope faction, regarding 'the political misuse of some media outlets of the rightful demands of reformists,' emphasizing that besides the government, 'other powers, foundations, headquarters, and institutions must also publish information related to their payments and receipts so that, God forbid, the suspicion of political motivations for these actions does not arise.' Ahmad Hatami Yazdi, a senior banking expert, wrote in a note in the newspaper Teadoll about the salary slip scandal, stating that the exposure of irregular salaries is a propaganda and electoral action by Hassan Rouhani's rivals, and 'for such individuals, news-making is not the end of the story, as they have also predicted the next steps. Today they expose salary figures, 'tomorrow they will reveal officials' assets and who owns what property and shares. Whether that is true or false remains to be seen.' The Teadoll columnist criticized Rouhani's government for its inaction regarding 'the discovery and exposure of methods of massive corruption in Ahmadinejad's government,' stating that some instances of corruption in the previous administration 'have not yet been exposed or discovered.' This newspaper emphasized that 'the first step Mr. Rouhani should take after uncovering how these salaries were paid and received is to identify the source and decision-maker for the large salaries,' noting that investigations conducted, including those regarding the National Development Fund, show that 'this regulation was approved during Ahmadinejad's government and in a cabinet meeting, so the root of the error lies there.' The Teadoll columnist emphasized that the salary levels of economic and banking managers in Germany, Italy, the UK, and Dubai are ten times the salaries of managers in these sectors in Iran, stating: 'Certainly, major and important entities in the country such as Bank Melli, National Petrochemical Company, National Iranian Oil Company, etc., due to their sensitivity, require very capable individuals to manage them, and if these specialized individuals do not receive appropriate salaries, they will have no desire to work.' Newspapers close to the principlists, including Kayhan, Javan, and Resalat, dedicated their main headlines in their Sunday issues to the Supreme Leader's response to the letter from Rouhani's deputy. Kayhan quoted the Supreme Leader as saying: 'All agencies must show sensitivity to irregular payments.' Resalat simultaneously quoted Ahmad Alamolhoda, the Friday prayer leader of Mashhad, stating: 'The government must explain to the people about the secret financial contract with the US.' According to this newspaper, Ahmad Alamolhoda criticized the Central Bank's contract with the international anti-money laundering organization, saying: 'Our dear ones in the government must explain why in this recent contract, which we unfortunately heard was also signed by the Central Bank's president, the US gains control over all financial relations of Iranian banks, including financial relations with resistance movements that the US calls terrorists.' Ali Khamenei's representative in Khorasan province also cited a statement from him saying: 'The judiciary must intervene in the international issues of the system and act in all legal proceedings of the system at the international level.' Resalat also noted in its editorial that the agreement between the Central Bank of Iran and the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has 'security implications for the country.' The newspaper Javan quoted Ahmad Tavakoli, a former member of the Islamic Consultative Assembly, stating: 'The government must act transparently regarding the commitments made to the FATF, as according to this agreement, the FATF will control all our accounts and prevent our money from being transferred.' Akbar Turkan, a senior advisor to Hassan Rouhani, however, stated in an interview with the newspaper Iran: 'They want to equate the billion-dollar corruption of the previous government with the 'managerial error' of irregular salaries.' He emphasized that 'the amount of money that some managers have received from irregular salaries does not even compare to the size of the embezzlements that occurred in the ninth and tenth governments; a fly's wing does not measure up to three thousand billion tomans or two billion seven hundred million dollars.' Najafgholi Habibi, a reformist political activist and a representative of the third parliament, also emphasized to the newspaper Etemad that the exposure of salary slips is part of a 'project to absolve Ahmadinejad's government.' According to Etemad, he also stated: 'The attacks that the hardline faction is currently making against Rouhani's government have entered a new phase. The issue of astronomical salary slips is a new anti-Rouhani project that has manifested itself in the always sensational approach of this faction. It is noteworthy that this new project of the hardliners is entirely a diversion.' The newspaper Farhikhtegan reported on 'the parliament's entry into the issue of threatening journalists,' stating: 'The security threats against journalists prompted reactions from three parliament members, and Mohammad Ali Vakili, Elias Hazrati, and Ali Motahari were the representatives who addressed this issue and called on the supervisory bodies to investigate who is behind the security threats against journalists.' According to this newspaper, Ali Motahari, the deputy speaker of parliament, and Elias Hazrati, a member of the Hope faction's central council, called on the Ministry of Intelligence and the Cyber Police to address this issue quickly, and Ali Motahari 'requested that the source of these messages be clarified quickly, the results be communicated to the public and the media, and the offenders be referred to the judiciary.' This newspaper quoted Elias Hazrati, a representative from Tehran, stating that with an official warning in parliament, 'he will demand the issue be pursued through the Ministry of Intelligence and the Cyber Police,' as these messages, which were sent from several specific numbers and contained information about journalists, 'have caused concern among cultural figures and must be dealt with seriously, and if this does not happen from the relevant authorities, certainly a group of journalists will file a lawsuit against the perpetrators of these incidents.' The newspaper Vaghaye Ettefaghieh published a report stating '4500 people were saved from suicide in 2015,' quoting the head of the social emergency center of the organization: 'Four thousand five hundred people in 2015 announced their intention to commit suicide either in person or by phone to this center.' This newspaper emphasized that 'the individuals saved from suicide accounted for those who intended to commit suicide but, according to the head of the social emergency center of the Welfare Organization, were dissuaded from their decision through consultations with social emergency experts,' reminding that 'the statistics do not include individuals who successfully committed suicide.' Vaghaye Ettefaghieh also reported that 'according to information from the country's forensic medicine organization, in the same year, 4020 people also committed suicide and lost their lives,' noting that 'many of the suicides that occurred, whether successful or unsuccessful, are not publicly disclosed for various reasons and do not appear in statistics.' Following the social media users' protests against the anti-American billboards of Tehran's municipality, the newspaper Javan, close to the Revolutionary Guards, wrote in its Sunday issue that the municipality's billboards 'have the duty to inform about the hidden realities of America,' but this issue has not pleased America's supporters in Iran. This newspaper close to the Revolutionary Guards even wrote: 'It may be hard to believe that in a country that has been in an unequal war with America for 37 years, some people would be outraged by the exposure of ugly American realities and use it as an opportunity to attack their political rival.' The newspaper Javan criticized Hassan Rouhani's government for opposing the imposition of further restrictions on social media, stating: 'The government tries to pay attention to the positive political aspects of social media members as much as possible. For this reason, it shows indifference to jokes made about the government's slogans and the President's key, and in response to terms and phrases like 'Hassan the Keymaker,' it uses a policy of gentle smiles.' However, 'government officials know well that social media is a place where the most serious issues are turned into jokes and many social issues are trivialized and disappear. Therefore, when the joke-makers turned to the municipality's billboards, they began to fish in the muddy waters created.' This newspaper also stated that highlighting domestic problems by social media users has led to 'the purification of America' by 'trivializing and questioning' the municipality's billboards, claiming that the reaction of social media to Tehran's municipality billboards has caused 'the launch of an electoral war and harm to Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf as a potential rival of Hassan Rouhani in the upcoming presidential election.' The newspaper Kaseb o Kar reported in a report titled 'Commotion in Mervi Alley' that 'the plan to combat the supply of smuggled goods in the Tehran market has been implemented.' According to this newspaper, 'the plan to combat the supply of smuggled goods began on Saturday morning in areas of the Tehran market and its outskirts, including Mervi Alley, while early notification of the plan's implementation led to the evacuation of many shops.' Kaseb o Kar also reported that 'a special plan to combat the smuggling of drugs, medicinal supplements, hygiene products, and foodstuffs has also begun in Tehran and other provinces,' stating that 'severe and legal action will be taken against sellers of smuggled goods upon observation.'