Author: Vorskanian Yeghisabet

HERE TO TORTURE, INSTRUCT AND PROTECT
By Jerry Tallmer

The Villager
eretotorture.html
May 28 2009

Ayvasian inspired by the power of pounding music, high boots

These boots were made for walking, and that’s just what they’ll do.

One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you.

–Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood, 1966

Everybody has a dirty little secret in Leslie Ayvasian’s "Make Me."

Hank and Sissy’s dirty little secret is that they are all washed up
and don’t know it.

Eddie and Connie’s dirty little secret is that Eddie is too bored
to take seriously the power games Connie pursues as soon as their
two girls are packed off to school every morning. Indeed, he plays
along — until it’s too late.

Phil’s dirty little secret is Mistress Lorraine, the dominatrix to
whose "dungeon" he goes to every day for punishment, by words and
whip, for being a weak, lousy mayor of the New Jersey town in which
they all live — and Phil isn’t his real name either.

The strands of these six lives, or three pairs — Hank and Sissy, Eddie
and Connie, Phil and Mistress Lorraine — are crisscrossed together
like intermeshing spiders’ webs by the playwright who did as much,
and more, for those reality based "Nine Armenians" of her own personal
bloodlines 13 years ago. There were no boots and whips in that poetic
drama, except perhaps on the feet and in the hands of Turkish soldiers
in 1915 slaughtering Armenians in the Forgotten Holocaust.

Here, in "Make Me," at the Atlantic Stage 2 on Chelsea’s West 16th
Street, it is to Mistress Lorraine in her Lower East Side dungeon
— in the midst of one of Phil’s groveling penitential sessions —
that Connie has come for instruction on how to wield a whip and make
it sting, how to swagger-stride in those huge high dominating boots,
all that.

So how did Connie find a dominatrix to study from? Why, on the
Internet, of course — just the way real-life Leslie Ayvasian,
playwright and sometime actress, found a real-life dominatrix to
educate the "Make Me" company in whip handling, boot swagger, and
other such matters.

"She comes to rehearsals and is absolutely fantastic," Ms. Ayvasian
said one morning last week; just before heading for Providence,
Rhode Island, for her son’s graduation from Brown University.

One doesn’t suppose your dominatrix taught the male actors how to whip.

"No," the playwright replied dryly,

The first sparks of "Nine Armenians" and of "Make Me" had flashed
upon her, she says, in different ways.

"With ‘Nine Armenians’ it was the single image of an Armenian-American
family in the driveway of their house, packing a car with food and
memories though they would only be separated a couple of hours."

"I was away too much [as an actress] when my son was growing up. So
I wrote ‘Nine Armenians’ for him.

"With ‘Make Me’ it was several things. First, my son the lead guitarist
and his rock band — this loud, pounding music that normally I would
not choose to be around. But here was my darling son, Ivan Anderson,
making this music since he was in seventh grade, and now he was a
senior at Brown!

"He’d even composed music for me when I was driving a car, and with
all this I started thinking in very literal terms about the kind of
power in this throbbing, pounding music that I’d found inspiring in
a way I hadn’t expected.

"That was one component.

"Another — this will sound funny — occurred when I was participating
in an actors’ workshop with Olympia Dukakis six years ago, when Ivan
was a senior in high school.

"This woman came in — I don’t know her name, never did — wearing
these huge, high boots. She saw me eyeing them, and said to me:
‘What size are you?’ and then handed them to me to wear. I started
walking around the room, and as I walked I felt a kind of power. When
I got back to my chair my shoes were gone and there was a note on
the chair saying she’d taken them. It left me with no choice except
to walk to my car in these huge, high boots."

The scenes (or intersecting fragments of scenes) in Mistress Lorraine’s
dungeon are comedic and degrading all rolled into one, for Mistress
Loraine, like Leslie Avasian’s Internet find, is, no matter how
domineering, a teacher, a painstaking — and pain-giving–instructor
at heart.

There is even a whiff of Jean Genet here.

MISTRESS: Foot fetish, pony play, leatherfetish, role play

CONNIE: Pony play?

MISTRESS: Pick up a crop. Flick it like this on the back of the
head. Remember pony play, Phil?…What did you do?

PHIL: I galloped, Mistress.

MISTRESS: Whar dud I do?

PHIL: Sat on my shoulders and gripped my head between your legs,
Mistress.

Suddenly I see, as if it were yesterday, tall, gorgeous Salome Jens
galloping around gloriously naked, tossing her long hair, whip in
hand, as the Pony Girl in José Quintero’s 1960 production of Genet’s
"The Balcony" at Circle-on-the-Square on Bleecker Street.

All of which brings us to a topic of some current national interest:
Torture. Does "Make Me’ not have some relevance here?

"To tell you the truth, not really," says the woman who wrote
it. "Not like Christopher Durang’s play, ‘Why Torture Is Wrong, and
the People Who Love Them.’ You know, the dominatrix and her client
have to have a very pure relationship. It’s like she says in the play
(when instructing Connie on ways and means):

" ‘Before you and your client…embark on a scene, you decide what
he can handle and what the limits are. You’re not here just to
torture. You’re here to protect!’"

Leslie Ayvasian, born-in-Boston Armenian, turns 60 this summer. (Her
play "High Dive" celebrated turning 50.) Ivan’s father is her husband,
prestigious architect Sam Anderson. "He’s very cool," she says. "I’ve
had a crush on him for 33 years."

The director of "Make Me" is Christian Parker. The actors are Jessica
Hecht as Connie, Anthony Arkin as Eddie, Ellen Parker as Sissy,
J.R. Horne as Hank, Richard Masur as Phil, and Candy Buckley as
Mistress Lorraine.

Yes, playwright Ayvasian still has those oversized boots. No, she says,
she doesn’t wear them. Cool.

MAKE ME Written by Leslie Ayvasian Directed by Christian Parker
Presented by Atlantic Theater Company May 31 through June
14 Atlantic Stage 2, 330 West 16th Street (212) 279-4200, or

BAKO SAHAKYAN: VOYAGE OF THE ARMENIA VESSEL IS THE BEST MANIFESTATION OF UNITY OF THE ARMENIAN PEOPLE

armradio.am
28.05.2009 13:19

On 28 May "Armenia" sailing vessel starts its round-the-world voyage.

On April 11 NKR President Bako Sahakyan met crew members of the sailing
vessel. The crew was headed by the leader of expedition Zori Balayan
and Captain Samvel Karapetyan.

The Head of the State noted the importance of this initiative, naming
it the best manifestation of inflexible will, courage and unity of
the Armenian people.

NKR President handed in Artsakh’s national flag to the members of
the crew and wished them successful voyage and safe return.

LEBANON’S CHRISTIANS STAND TO PLAY ELECTION KINGMAKERS
Rana Moussaoui

Agence France Presse
May 27, 2009 Wednesday 1:34 AM GMT

Lebanon’s divided Christians represent the swing vote in a legislative
election in which the Iranian-backed Hezbollah is vying to oust the
pro-Western faction which currently dominates parliament.

"The Christian vote will tip the balance," Melhem Chaoul, a sociology
professor at the state-run Lebanese University, told AFP.

"They are the arbiters from a numerical or technical viewpoint rather
than because of their political weight."

Once the dominant community in terms of numbers, Lebanon’s Christians
are now a minority made up mainly of Catholics, Maronites, Orthodox
and Armenians.

For decades, Christian emigration from Lebanon was rampant and their
numbers have shrunk inexorably over the years.

Today, Christians make up an estimated 35 percent of Lebanon’s four
million inhabitants and their political loyalty is deeply divided
between the two camps facing off in the June 7 vote.

One side, ironically identified in Lebanese circles as the "Shiite
Christians," backs the Hezbollah alliance while the so-called "Sunni
Christians" favour the curent majority led by Saad Hariri, son of
slain ex-premier Rafiq Hariri.

"Lebanon’s Christians have failed to create for themselves a true
force capable of transcending the political divisions in the country,"
Chaoul said.

He was referring to the political crisis that shook Lebanon in the
aftermath of Rafiq Hariri’s murder in 2005 and brought the country
close to civil war last year.

"The Christians didn’t manage to set their own political agenda and
simply follow one side or the other," Chaoul added. "Some campaign
with the Shiites against the Sunnis, and vice versa."

A campaign banner for one of the few independent candidates sums up
the reality on the ground.

"We do not want a Shiite Maronite, we do not want a Sunni Maronite,
we want a true Maronite: Yes to a strong Christian role," it reads.

The 1990 Taif Accord, which helped bring an end to Lebanon’s 15-year
civil war and Syria’s dominant role in Lebanese affairs for nearly
30 years, stripped the Christians of much of their power.

But thanks to Lebanon’s complex confessional system, they can still
influence the outcome of the upcoming legislative poll as the 128 seats
in parliament are allocated equally between Christians and Muslims.

For that reason, candidates in a handful of districts will be battling
to win over the Christian vote.

One key battleground, for example, will be the eastern town of Zahle,
a Christian stronghold in the mainly Muslim Bekaa Valley, where five
seats reserved for Christian candidates are up for grabs.

The outcome of the vote for the town’s two other parliamentary seats,
one for a Sunni candidate and another for a Shiite, is already a given.

"If it weren’t for the Christians, there would be no electoral battle,"
said Okab Sakr, a Muslim candidate allied with the US-backed majority
in Zahle.

The town’s voters, for their part, say they are preparing for a tough
battle to ensure ther side wins.

"If Hezbollah wins, we risk another war with Israel and Syria
will regain its influence here," said Elie Hallak, a 56-year-old
teacher. "It already has a lot of power, and if it wins, it will do
what it pleases."

Tamar Apkarian, an Armenian supporter of the Hezbollah-led faction,
disagrees.

"As long as there is no guarantee that Israel will not attack us,
we need Hezbollah’s weapons to defend our country," she said.

RA AND NKR FLAGS ON MAMAYEV KURGAN AROUSED AZERI MEDIA INDIGNATION

/PanARMENIAN.Net/
27.05.2009 12:04 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ An Armenian delegation headed by Ataman of
International Cossack Union Sergei Madatyan participated in the 2nd
congress of Orthodox Cossack youth. For the first time in history,
flags of Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh were hoisted on Mamayev Kurgan
at the height of 102 meters.

Ataman Madatyan was handed two bags of soil, one of them will be
poured out in the Victory Park in Yerevan while the second will be
sent to NKR, reported Yerkramas, the newspaper of Armenians of Russia.

Azeri media did not take long to comment on the event. Head of Cossack
association of Azerbaijan Viktor Merezhkin, Azerbaijan was invited
to the event but the delegation could not go because of lack of means.

"We would have prevented what had happened," Merezhkin said.

ARMENIAN OMBUDSMAN PRESENTS OSCE-SUPPORTED REPORT ON HUMAN RIGHTS PROTECTION AND DISCIPLINARY POLICY IN THE ARMY

ArmInfo
2009-05-27 16:09:00

A report on human rights protection and disciplinary policy in the
armed forces of Armenia prepared by experts from the OSCE Office
in Yerevan and the Human Rights Defender’s Office was presented
today. The study looks at human rights protection in the context
of disciplinary policy in the army. It provides legal guidance in
the fields of disciplinary offences and penalties, the commanders’
responsibilities and disciplinary procedure to ensure that human
rights are protected.

"Respect for the rule of law and civil oversight over human rights
protection in the armed forces are fundamental in a democratic
society," said Carel Hofstra, Acting Head of the OSCE Office in
Yerevan. "The study aims to ensure that internal discipline measures
are applied in a fair and transparent way. Disciplinary sanctions
carry a punitive character and that puts a great responsibility
on individual commanders, and this study provides guidance on the
guarantees and recourses that should be made available."

Armen Harutyunyan, the Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) of Armenia,
added: "This report highlights problems related to the disciplinary
legislation and practice that often cause human rights violations in
the armed forces of Armenia. I hope that the analysis and assessments
provided by the report will serve as a useful guide in reforming the
armed forces’ disciplinary regulatory framework for the benefit of
human rights protection."

The report emphasizes that offences that require disciplinary actions
must be clearly defined, and gives a range of recommendations that
commanders must consider when imposing a disciplinary penalty. It
also focuses on commanders’ responsibility to prevent offences and
ensure internal order at the army. In addition, it addresses the
correlation between access to information and confidentiality.

The study was carried out as part of co-operation between the OSCE
Office in Yerevan and the Human Rights Defender’s Office that aims
to promote democratic oversight over the armed forces in Armenia.

WHERE DOES YOUR CANDIDATE STAND?

AZG Armenian Daily
27/05/2009

Armenians in Europe

AGBU Europe asks Euro-candidates to state position on 7 key issues
The Armenian organization AGBU Europe has launched a pre-electoral
campaign asking candidates in the European elections for their position
on key issues. In June 2009, many of the one million Armenians in
Europe will have a chance to vote in the European elections. Their
vote could affect the future of Armenia or that of the Diaspora:
the European Union makes important decisions for all Europeans,
including Armenians around Europe. The campaign consists in asking
candidates in every EU country 7 questions on relevant EU policies and
in publishing their answers. This will provide Europeans, Armenians
included, with information to help them choose between candidates on
election day. Crucially, it will raise awareness among candidates,
and remind them that their electors care about these issues. Relevant
EU policies include those that concern Armenia’s future European
integration and the newly launched Eastern Partnership, policies on
culture, language and freedom and justice; peace-making in the South
Caucasus and the future of Nagorno-Karabakh; and Turkey’s accession
prospects and the recognition of the Armenian genocide. With this
campaign, the organisation hopes to encourage Armenians in Europe to
form an opinion on EU policies and to use their vote knowingly. The
campaign also intends to generate debate and raise awareness among
future members of the European Parliament about these important
questions. The Armenian Diaspora in the EU is estimated at around one
million. Though the Diaspora has a very long history in many European
countries, most European Armenians trace their roots to the Republics
of Turkey or Armenia. For more information on Armenians and Europe,
see Individuals and organizations interested in
raising these issues with their candidates to the European elections
are encouraged to contact them and publicize their answers. All
information about the campaign, including the 7 questions, answers
received and the contact coordinates of the main political parties
running in the European elections in each country can be found at:
AGBU Europe is the European
branch of the Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU). Established
in 1906, AGBU ( or ) is
the world’s largest non-profit Armenian organization and is
headquartered in New York City. AGBU works to preserve and promote
the Armenian identity and heritage through educational, cultural
and humanitarian programs, annually serving some 400,000 Armenians
on five continents. For more information contact AGBU Europe, Flora
Hakobyan, tel : 33 1 45 200 318, email: mailto:[email protected]

In Lebanon’s Patchwork, a Focus on Armenians’ Political Might

dleeast/26armenians.html?_r=1&hpw
May 25, 2009

BEIRUT, Lebanon

– Their political apparatus is a model of discipline. Their vast array
of social services is a virtual state within a state. Their enemies
accuse them of being pawns of Syria and Iran.

Bryan Denton for The New York Times

Hagop Havatian, a Tashnaq official, under a portrait of the party’s
founders. The party operates in 35 nations.

They are the Armenian Christians of Lebanon, one of the Middle East’s
most singular and least-understood communities. And if they sound a
bit like Hezbollah, the Shiite militant group based here, that is no
accident.

Last month, the main Armenian political bloc decided to support Hezbollah’s
alliance in the coming parliamentary elections in Lebanon against the
pro-American parliamentary majority. Because of their role as a crucial
swing vote, the Armenians could end up deciding who wins and who loses in
what is often described as a proxy battle between Iran, Hezbollah’s patron,
and the West.

That fact has brought new attention to the Armenians, a distinct and
borderless ethnic group that is spread throughout the region much as the
Jews once were. In Lebanon, they have their own schools, hospitals and
newspapers. They speak their own language, with its own alphabet
< egion/13ink.html> . Their main
political party, Tashnaq, operates in 35 countries and has a secretive world
committee that meets four times a year. Their collective memory of the
genocide carried out against them in Turkey from 1915 to 1918 helps maintain
their identity in a far-flung diaspora.

"There is a sense of invisible nationhood across borders," said Paul
Haidostian, the president of Haigazian University, the Armenian university
in Beirut.

In fact, their political enemies here accuse the Armenians of siding with
Hezbollah in order to protect the substantial Armenian populations in Syria
and Iran. But the Armenian political leadership says it is fully independent
and has no ideological sympathy for either of Lebanon’s two main political
camps.

Instead, the Armenians say, they are voting with the opposition for reasons
that are entirely local and pragmatic: it offered them full control over the
parliamentary seats in Armenian-dominated districts. The other side did not,
said Hovig Mekhitarian, the chairman of the Lebanese branch of Tashnaq.

"We want candidates who represent our community," Mr. Mekhitarian said. "We
are not with the opposition, and not with the majority."

That dynamic is common enough in Lebanon, a checkerboard of mutually
suspicious sectarian groups that are usually more concerned with protecting
their own interests than with advancing any broader national or regional
agenda.

But even in Lebanon, the Armenians stand out for their independence. During
the 1975-1990 civil war, the Armenians refused to take sides. Tashnaq
discouraged its members from leaving the country (though many Armenians did
leave), in deference to Lebanese patriotism. Officially, the party is
socialist, but its only real credo is survival.

Mr. Haidostian said: "I remember when I used to get stopped at a checkpoint,
they would ask, ‘Are you Christian or Muslim?’ I would say ‘Armenian,’ and
it was like a third category. They didn’t know what to do."

Despite the risks, many Armenians say they find Lebanon a uniquely
accommodating place, largely because its weak state allows them to live
almost as a separate nation. "There is something tentative about Lebanese
identity, and in that questioning Armenians have found a comfortable space,"
Mr. Haidostian said.

Although there have been Armenians here for centuries, they first came in
large numbers after the genocide. Later wars and crises led to more
migration, increasing the size of the Lebanese Armenian community to 240,000
by the 1970s. The creation of the independent state of Armenia in 1918 had
provided refuge to some, but its small size and role as a Soviet client
state after 1920 set limits on its role as an Armenian homeland.

In Lebanon, the Armenians had an unusual mix of freedom and insecurity,
allowing them to practice their religion and culture, but also limiting
their assimilation into the general culture. In the United States, Armenians
often marry outside their group and are less likely to speak their own
language; here, they remain far more distinct.

The Beirut neighborhood of Bourj Hamoud is a kind of miniature Armenia, with
shop signs written in Armenian script and a dense, familial culture of
working-class shops, homes and restaurants. The Lebanese branch of Tashnaq
is based there, flying the party’s distinctive banner bearing a pen, a
shovel and a dagger – representing ideology, work and struggle. There is
also a rich network of schools, orphanages, retirement homes and hospitals.
Schoolchildren learn three languages (and three different alphabets), and
start on a fourth language in the fourth grade.

Maintaining this independence requires political skill. During the
civil war, Bourj Hamoud was trapped geographically between Christian
and Palestinian areas, and its leaders had to work hard to avoid
becoming a target for either side.

Recently, that neutrality has been difficult to preserve. Tashnaq has long
been a de facto Syrian ally, partly because of Syria’s former military
domination of Lebanon. After the Syrian withdrawal in 2005, it remained in
the Syrian political camp, mainly because it blamed the other side for an
electoral law that divided Armenian districts and reduced its power.

This spring, Saad Hariri, the leader of the pro-American parliamentary
majority, tried to mend fences with Tashnaq, which controls the vast
majority of Armenian votes. He had good reason: last year the electoral law
was revised in a way that restored the Armenians’ power.

Lebanese Christians represent the swing vote in this election, and the
160,000-strong Armenian community is by far the most unified subgroup of
those votes. If Mr. Hariri could have persuaded Tashnaq to vote with him,
the balance might have tipped in his favor to defeat Hezbollah and its
allies.

He did not succeed. Mr. Mekhitarian said Mr. Hariri had not offered enough.
"He was really only offering one seat, and he wanted our support in 15 other
seats," Mr. Mekhitarian said.

Members of Mr. Hariri’s party who took part in the negotiations offered a
slightly different account. They said Mr. Hariri offered to satisfy
Tashnaq’s demands on parliamentary seats, but only if the party would commit
firmly to supporting him before and after the elections. It would not do so,
they said.

That is not surprising. In a sense, the Armenians cannot afford to make such
political commitments. Like the Druse and other minorities in Lebanon, they
believe they must subordinate all ideological principles to a nimble defense
of their community.

"In politics, you can’t always be neutral," said Hagop Pakradounian, a
Tashnaq member of Parliament. "But we try to maintain links to all sides."

PRESIDENT OF CROATIA: MY FIRST OFFICIAL VISIT TO ARMENIA WILL OPEN NEW CHAPTER IN CROATIAN-ARMENIAN RELATIONS

ArmInfo
2009-05-22 14:20:00

ArmInfo. Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan and President of Croatia
Stepan Mesic have discussed the present level of the Armenian-Croatian
relations and the prospects of their development, Armenian President
Serzh Sargsyan said at today’s joint press-conference with his
Croatian counterpart.

He also added further development of the Armenian-Croatian relations
in the sphere of policy, economy and culture as well as extension of
the contractual and legal basis is very important for Armenia. ‘Taking
into account that Croatia pretends on membership in the European Union
and Armenia is a participant in the initiatives about cooperation of
the European Union organizations, the parties agreed to investigate
possibility of cooperation within the frames of European Neighborhood
Policy and Eastern Partnership’, – Sargsyan said. Both presidents
agreed that regional conflicts should be resolved only without force
application, via peace and according to the principles and norms
of international law. ‘I have accepted President Mesic’s invitation
to visit Croatia, and I am sure I will visit Croatia this year’, –
President Sargsyan said.

For his part, Croatia’s President Stepan Mesic said this is his
first official visit to Armenia and it is a fact-finding one. ‘We
can cooperate with Armenia at mutually beneficial basis in different
spheres, in particular, economy, education, culture and sports’, –
Mesic said and expressed hope that his visit will open a new chapter
in the Croatian-Armenian relations.

To note, Cooperation Agreement in the sphere os education and science,
culture as well as agreements about ruling out of dual taxation and
incomes were signed between the governments of Armenia and Croatia.

ST. VARTAN CATHEDRAL’S BRONZE ENTRY DOORS TO BE BLESSED ON MAY 31

Noyan Tapan
May 19, 2009

NEW YORK, MAY 19, NOYAN TAPAN – ARMENIANS TODAY. St. Vartan Mother
Cathedral’s new three bronze entry doors will be solemnly opened and
blessed on May 31 at the Cathedral.

St. Vartan Mother Cathedral last year celebrated its 40th anniversary
of its concecration. The majestic structure located in Manhattan is
the most ambitious undertaking of the Armenian American community and
it stands as a monument to the Armenian presence in the U.S. Although
the structure has long been completed a number of the refinements of
the original cathedral project were put on hold in 1960, for financial
and other reasons, at the time of its construction.

On May 31 the new bronze doors of the Cathedral, which are remarkable
works of art and depict the baptism of Armenia’s King Drtad III by
St. Gregory the Illuminator, will be blessed during the open ceremony
held at the Cathedral.

PRODUCTS FROM ARMENIA, UZBEKISTAN AND TAJIKISTAN TO BE DESTROYED IN TUMEN REGION OF RUSSIA

/PanARMENIAN.Net/
19.05.2009 12:36 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Animal products belonging to passengers from Armenia,
Uzbekistan and Tajikistan were confiscated in the airport of Tumen
city, Russia.

50 kg of milk products, 14 kg of meat and some two dozens eggs will
be destroyed.

The measure is conditioned by necessity to prevent diseases like
swine flu, African swine fever and bird flu.