Speaking at the Jaffna Press Club last week, Tamil National Alliance’s candidate for the Jaffna district, Ananthy Sasitharan, expressed her desire to meet with Navi Pillay, and outline the harsh realities of the situation in the North-East, and reiterated that the Tamil nation was not defeated.

“As a representative of kith and kin who have been struggling for four years without knowing the whereabouts of thousands of family members who had surrendered to the Sri Lanakn military.”

“We have been waging several protests to know the whereabouts of our family members. We have even gone to the LLRC and witnessed there. Nothing has happened so far. Now, after four years, we have decided to strengthen the political voice and are looking forward to secure an appointment with the visiting Human Rights Commissioner with the hope that we would be able to put forward all our problems within the allocated time to Ms Navaneetham Pillay.”

Sasitharan reiterated that thousands of war widows were in need of a political voice.

Asked by members of the press to outline what support she had received from the TNA towards her campaign to find those disappeared, Ananthy Sasitharan admitted that the party had not provided any support nor raised the issue in any significant way. She reiterated that bringing this issue forward was one of her main priorities. She further outlined that one of the main reasons she joined the TNA was so that she had adequate safety and political support to openly chase up such issues

Speaking on the recent rape of a woman, by alleged Sri Lankan military, Sasitharan said,

“Many incidents of this nature are not known outside of Sri Lanka. All of these are not being addressed and that is why I am contesting the election to strengthen the political voice. The people who are being targeted need to find a safe living condition.”