in a joint session of the cabinet and the Majlis, mullahs’ President Mohammad Khatami

in a joint session of the cabinet and the Majlis, mullahs’ President Mohammad Khatami acknowledged that stoning to death and repression had increased “several fold.” 
Khatami’s admission comes as the clerical regime’s officials, including its diplomats, mostly from his own faction, have been claiming for several years in international forums that stoning to death had been halted in Iran.
In an attempt to disavow responsibility, he said, “What would have been the problem if instead of flogging and a several-fold increase in stoning to death during the period of reform, we had stood by each other and resolved these problems?”