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Unverified news reports from that country indicate that Sitsabaiesan, MP for Scarborough-Rouge River since 2011, was confined to her hotel on Dec. 31 in the northern city of Jaffna while on a “fact finding mission.”
She was met at the hotel by officers from Sri Lanka’s “Terrorist Investigation Department,” according to the reports.
Thasan Ganeshalingam, the president of the Scarborough-Rouge River riding association, told the Star Tuesday evening that Sitsabaiesan, 32, landed in Sri Lanka on Dec. 28, and was visiting a camp for displaced people and talking to local politicians earlier this week.
She was set to return to Canada on Jan. 4, he said. Ganeshalingam said he had been in touch with her daily via text message, and she had been telling him that everything was going fine.
On Monday evening, he texted Sitsabaiesan, but received no response.
“At first I just thought she was busy, but now (Tuesday) we’re reading these reports and we’re worried,” he said. “I’m going to try to talk with her really soon.”
A spokesperson with the Office of the Leader of the Opposition said he could not confirm the story, but that the Office had been in contact with the Sri Lanka High Commission in Ottawa.
Sitsabaiesan, who was born in Sri Lanka, is the first Tamil elected to the House of Commons. She had been a vocal critic of the Sri Lankan government and its treatment of Tamils during the country’s civil war.
After her election in 2011, Sitsabaiesan was one of the main backers of an Amnesty International Canada petition calling on the Canadian government to urge the United Nations to create an independent body in order to investigate war crimes committed during the war in Sri Lanka.
According to biographical information provided by the NDP, she worked at the University of Toronto Students’ Union before being elected MP. While a student at the U of T, she was also vice-president of the Tamil Students’ Association.
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