PARIS—A human rights association criticized Iran on Tuesday for executing a former lawyer on charges of taking part in a 1980 coup attempt….

FIDH said Assadi had not had a fair trial and urged the international community to use all available means to end alleged human rights violations in Iran.

The Paris-based FIDH groups 89 national human rights leagues.

[The NCR condemned the execution of Mr. Assadi and said that: "The execution of Mohammad Assadi in the second week of Khatami's presidency is yet another indication that change and reform are but a mirage in this medieval dictatorship. Diplomatic and economic ties with the mullahs' regime will only embolden them in their pursuit of repression and export of terrorism."]

Khatami's Cabinet Signals Continued, Repression And Terrorism—Rajavi, Iran Zamin News Agency, August 12 

The NCR issued a statement today regarding Khatami's 22 cabinet selections and indicated that there were no women in the list while, compared to the previous cabinets, more clergymen were picked.

Mr. Massoud Rajavi, President of the NCR, said that the cabinet introduced by Khatami signals "continued and stepped-up repression and export of terrorism."

According to the statement, Mr. Rajavi described Rafsanjani's removal from presidency as "a fatal error" by Khamenei, which "has expedited the trend of developments against the regime and in favor of the Iranian Resistance."

One of the main issues of contention between Khamenei and Khatami was the choice of Minister of Intelligence, the NCR said. With the appointment of Ghorban-Ali Dorri Najaf-Abadi, the Ministry continues to remain under Khamenei's control. Khamenei and his faction had warned that should their favorite candidate not be appointed to this post, they would introduce a high priority bill which would change the Ministry of Intelligence to the Organization for Intelligence and Security, wresting this body from Khatami's control.

Mullah Abdollah Nouri, Khatami's choice for the Minister of Interior and member of the Central Council of the Assembly of Combatant Clergy, was Khomeini's representative in the Revolutionary Guards Corps in the 1980s and played a significantly active role in repression and terror. In an interview with The New York Times, June 22, 1993, he openly endorsed the assassination of Iranian dissidents abroad.

Mullah Mohammad Isma'il Shoushtari, the choice for the Justice Ministry, has held the same post for the last eight years. He is among officials responsible for the execution of 15,000 political prisoners in 1988. He has repeatedly said that human rights was a means with which great powers pressured Iran.

Hossein Mozzaffar, Khatami's proposed Minister of Education, was Tehran's Director General for Education for many years. He acknowledges to have sent tens of thousands of elementary and high school students to the war fronts during the Iran-Iraq war.

The NCR said that more than sixty percent of Khatami's cabinet members were affiliated with the Assembly of Combatant Clergy, which "holds the most totalitarian views on domestic policy, export of terrorism, and state-controlled economy and has demonstrated hysteric enmity to western countries."

Besides Khatami and Nouri, Mohammad Moussavi Kho'ieniha, the mastermind of the U.S. Embassy take-over in Tehran in 1979; Ali Akbar Mohtashami, the principal figure behind the regime's bloodiest explosions and terrorist crimes in the region, particularly in Lebanon; Hassan Sane'i, president of the 15th Khordad Foundation which announced a $2.5 million reward for the murder of Salman Rushdie; and Mehdi Karroubi, the former parliament speaker, are also members of the central council of the Assembly of Combatant Clergy. Khatami is reportedly planning to choose most of his deputies and advisors from among them.

Iran Assembly Gets Khatami Compromise Cabinet List, Reuter, August 12

…Analysts said the nomination of conservative cleric and parliament deputy Qorbanali Dorri Najafabadi as intelligence (internal security) minister was an important concession by the reformist president to his opponents in parliament.

Dorri Najafadadi would replace Ali Fallahiyan against whom Germany last year issued an arrest warrant for allegedly ordering political killings in Berlin. Iran denied the charges.

Khatami named United Nations ambassador Kamal Kharrazi to replace Ali Akbar Velayati as foreign minister.

Kharrazi is seen by diplomats as a loyal technocrat unlikely to herald major changes in foreign policy, the realm of supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei. Khamenei has rejected the possibility of a thaw in relations with the United States….

One diplomat said nominations for the three central posts of foreign affairs, intelligence and defense would be quickly accepted by parliament conservatives.

"Each of them stands for the status quo, promising little change in the short-term," the diplomat said….

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