Police have questioned two people in connection with the death of Japanese national Asami Nagakiya. The two are not being called suspects.

Ms. Nagakiya’s body was found at the Queens Park Savannah on Ash Wednesday morning. An autopsy yesterday revealed that 30 year-old Ms. Nagakiya, was manually strangled to death before she was thrown into some bushes under a tree around the savannah.

Ms. Nagakiya was a trained musician by profession and arrived in Trinidad and Tobago on January 8^th to participate in carnival related events. She was from Sapporo in the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido.

Pathologist Dr. Valery Alexandrov at the Forensic Science Centre, St. James, carried out the autopsy. It is also reported that swabs are to be taken and analysed to determine whether there was sexual assault. And out of the death of the Ms. Nagakiya comes a controversy fueled by the comments of the Port of Spain Mayor.

Mayor Raymond Tim Kee made a link between the death of the woman and lewd and vulgar behaviour at carnival time. He called for a curbing of such behaviour. The comments of the mayor have now triggered calls for him to be removed.

Mayor Tim Kee has apologised for the statements, but said they were misconstrued. The opposition leader Kamla Persad Bissessar said an apology is not enough. Opposition Senator Khadijah Ameen and many on social media have called for the mayor to go.

There is a report that some may join a protest outside city hall today, insisting the mayor leave office. Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley says he sees no reason to remove the mayor from office.