TEHRAN – Former Iranian diplomat Hossein Amirabdollahian has written his memories of the Syrian crisis in a book named “Morning of Damascus”.

The book published by Sureh-Mehr and the Art Bureau was unveiled during a special ceremony at the Martyr Soleimani Foundation in Tehran on Monday.

Art Bureau director Mohammad-Mehdi Dadman, Soleimani’s daughter Zeinab and Amirabdollahian attended the ceremony.

Amirabdollahian said, “Hajji Qassem Soleimani never ignored the details during his hard work, and this is what I know about him after two decades.”

“About one year before he was martyred, he told me once, ‘I don’t have much time and chance to write my memories, though I have written what I have seen and been through all these years in dozens of notebooks, but you try to write down your memories of Syria as much as you can and keep them for next generations’,” Amirabdollahian said.

Soleimani, the commander of the Quds Force, the overseas arm of IRGC, was martyred during a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad on January 3.

“He asked me to write and depict all the bravery, sacrifice and martyrdom of those who were martyred to keep them for the next generations to understand what happened and how this sacrifice came about,” he added.

Amirabdollahian also thanked Sureh-Mehr for the publication of the book.

Amirabdollahian was the former deputy foreign minister for Arab and African Affairs. He is currently the Special Aide on International Affairs of the Islamic Parliament.

In his brief words, Dadman said he also hoped that the book would be a beginning for other books by those who were present in the region.

Hojjatoleslam Saeid Fakhrzadeh, also present at the ceremony, said that the book is a diplomatic narration of the crisis in Syria, with a glance at the role of Iran in the improvement of the crisis in the region. 

Photo: Author Hossein Amirabdollahian hands a copy of his book “Morning of Damascus” to Martyr Soleimani Foundation director Zeinab Soleimani during the unveiling ceremony of the book in Tehran on October 12, 2020. (Mehr/Mahmud Rahimi)

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