KIDNAPPED ELDERLY ARMENIAN IN AUSTRALIA IS FEARED DEAD

            Chris Baghsarian, the 85-year-old Armenian widower, who was kidnapped from his home in suburban Sydney 12 days ago, has been found dead, unconfirmed reports say.

Police found the remains of what could be the body of the innocent man who was taken in a botched kidnap early last Friday, near a golf course, about 50kms away.

Even before the discovery, fears and doubts about his safety began surfacing, as police ramped up their investigation.

Sources familiar with the criminal mentality believed his chances were doomed right after the kidnappers realized they had the wrong man, a fact police kept hammering over the airways and through other sources that would reach the perpetrators…

Detective Chief Inspector Andrew Marks minced no words expressing his concern and urging the speedy return of the victim.

Voicing his fears, he said it was not “a great feeling we have in relation to his health and his survival, so every day for us is of important.”

He noted the elderly man’s family were “devastated.”

“This is not the world they live in, it’s taken them by shock,” he said.

But despite their gross blunder, the kidnappers had no intention of playing ball.

They set up temporary camp in an abandoned homestead a distance away after burning the getaway car. They used another, burnt that also, and decamped to a rural village.

When the police finally reached the site, they stumbled upon the remains of what might be Chris Baghsarian.

Chris was born in Jaffa but spent most of his childhood and youth in the Old Armenian Quarter of the City of Jerusalem.

They were halcyon days, when he felt at home among the score of relatives and friends, the close-knit community of Armenians, survivors of the Turkish genocide or descendants of survivors.

He had six uncles, of whom two died young, four aunts and a dozen cousins, all linked together in an unbreakable bond molded in faith, love and devotion.

He attended the Armenian parish school and unlike some of his elder cousins who were given to pranks, he was quiet and modest.

His one great vice as a youth was smoking Lucky Strike or some other American cigarette which he obtained at a discount from a staffer at a UN center.

When he left school, he was apprenticed at a photographer’s, honing the skills he would find useful when he joined a movie distribution company in Sydney.

He arrived in Australia in the 60s.

Obtaining a migrant visa was a piece of cake at the time. All one had to do was head to the British Consulate in East Jerusalem.

In Sydney, he married and bought a house in North Ryde (the one broken into).

His wife passed away a few years ago.

In the garden at the back of the house, she planted parsley and mint which she allowed to grow wild: when ready, she used them in her cooking and for her tabbouleh.

The swimming pool there was mostly the domain of visiting children.

Nursing a beer, Chris would relax on a lounge and watch them gamboling, like a hawk ready to pounce at the slightest hint of trouble.

He kept in touch by mail with his family and community in the Old City, and went back to Jerusalem for a reunion with his ailing parents, relatives and friends.

In their convivial company he enjoyed a rare idyll, denied in the hectic run of life back in Australia.

And gorged with “dang-the-calories” delicacies unavailable as yet in Sydney, he came back to Sydney, saddled with undeclared (body) weight.