TEHRAN – Ayatollah Ali Khamenei says the future of the Islamic Revolution is “bright”.

The Leader of the Islamic Revolution made the remarks on Monday in a meeting with a number of students, academics, science minister, the Islamic Azad University chancellor, health minister, and vice president for scientific affairs.

Following is an excerpt of the Leader’s remarks:

Those who make criticism are going to take the fate of the country into their own hands tomorrow (meaning in the future), and that the prospect of tomorrow is “bright”.

Many of the criticisms that you make are acceptable but there is a difference between you as fervent youths and us who have many experiences behind.

You (students) express your views very frankly but I personally feel the progresses through experience.

Those who are pessimistic about the future should “correct” their views.

There was a wrong view at the beginning of the revolution that the “revolution” continues until the formation of government (system) and after victory the revolutionary views should be set aside. But revolution has stages: In the first stage the values are realized; in the second stage values are realized in a revolutionary society; and the last stage is the establishment of “Islamic or revolutionary civilization”.

Therefore, revolution does not end. A perpetual reform is needed to achieve the ideal of the revolution. The great ideals of the Islamic revolution are: national dignity, national confidence, political, economic and cultural independence, free thinking, establishment of justice and eliminating discrimination…

These goals will not be realized in short term. If the revolutionary approaches persist, these goals will certainly will be materialized.

I am personally aware of the country’s affairs and read the reports. I believe that in all these ideals that I enumerated we have made progresses.

I grasp the feelings of that young student who says the situation is “very bad”, but I definitely do not confirm his remarks.