Judiciary Chief Thanks Leader Over Special Courts

Date: 07 September 2020 - 22:08

News ID: ۸۲۵۶۲

TEHRAN (Dispatches) – Judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi on Monday thanked Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei for agreeing to extend the mandate of special tribunals set up to try economic corruption cases.
"We thank the Eminent Leader of the Revolution who agreed with the Judiciary’s proposal regarding special courts for combating disruption in the economic system,” Raisi said during a session here.
The courts were established in 2018 on the request of former Judiciary chief Ayatollah Sadeq Amoli Larijani in the face of the special conditions which he described as "an economic war.”
Ayatollah Amoli Larijani proposed then in a letter to the Leader that new tribunals be set up for two years and directed to hand down maximum sentences to those "disrupting and corrupting the economy.”
The Leader accepted the proposal, saying, "The purpose should be to punish corrupt financial criminals swiftly and fairly.”
Ever since, the Islamic Republic has successfully tracked and hunted down many heavy-weight corrupters, who had monopolized profit across key economic sectors.
On Sunday, various Iranian media outlets reported that the Leader had agreed to extend the mandate of the trials after being asked by the new Judiciary chief.
The new trials would, however, incorporate some reforms in their practices, the reports said.
In his letter, Raisi said the Judiciary would soon present the parliament with its proposals for optimizing existing legal vehicles that are used for confronting corruption.
"The amendments in the new proposal include an emphasis on the courts to continue their operations with determination and justice in a way that both the corrupt are dealt with and the punishment is meted out within the law,” he said on Monday.
"Our next step is to change the mandate of these courts from an emergency and exceptional order to an institutionalized one. We will ask the parliament to turn this process into a comprehensive plan which incorporates both determination and speed and accuracy and justice so that the corrupters will not have a chance,” Raisi added.
In addition to confrontation, the Judiciary chief said, what will take the opportunity from the corruptors is the reform of the corrupt structures by the government and the parliament.
"Reforming corrupt structures in the banking and monetary systems, as well as exports and imports, will reduce the crimes referred to these courts,” he said.
Speaking to the media earlier this year, the Judiciary chief’s first deputy Gholamhussein Mohseni-Eje’i said should the parliament approve of the trials, their mandate would not need to be extended upon expiry any more.
The special courts were set up in the mayhem following a record devaluation of the rial which lost nearly two-thirds of its value after U.S. President Donald Trump abandoned a landmark nuclear deal with Iran in May 2018 and announced the most restrictive sanctions on the Islamic Republic.
Dozens of people were arrested for disrupting the forex and gold coins market, including a man and his accomplices who had hoarded two tonnes of gold coins over several months in order to manipulate the market.
The sharp drop in the rial’s value prompted a registration flurry of new companies which received government dollars at concessionary prices for imports but sold them at inflated rates in the black market.