Ten members of the Sri Lankan delegation defected during the Commonwealth Games which ended on Sunday in Birmingham, Britain, a senior sports official in the country told AFP on Sunday.
Nine athletes and a coach slipped away from their team after completing their tests, said the official, who requested anonymity.
Three of them, judoka Chamila Dilani, her trainer Asela de Silva and wrestler Shanith Chathuranga left the delegation last week. They were located by the police but having broken no law and being in possession of visas valid for six months, no action was taken against them, the Sri Lankan official said.
“Since then, seven others have disappeared. We think they want to stay in the UK, maybe to find a job there,” the official added.
The leaders of the Sri Lankan delegation in Birmingham had anticipated this scenario by keeping the passports of its 160 members to ensure that they would return home safely, but these measures were not sufficient.
For a long time, athletes from Sri Lanka have taken advantage of their trip abroad to defect. This phenomenon has been amplified with the worsening of the economic crisis, the worst that the country has known.
Back in 2004, when Sri Lanka didn’t even have a national handball team, 23 people claiming to represent their country made their way to a tournament in Germany before disappearing into thin air.
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