The Canadian Olympic Committee says it is taking action after receiving a complaint of sexual misconduct against its president, Marcel Aubut.

The COC put out a statement on the matter after the Globe and Mail published a report Wednesday evening citing sources who say a female staff member of the Canadian Olympic Foundation has filed a sexual harassment complaint against Aubut. Aubut is the chairman of the Canadian Olympic Foundation, the fundraising arm of the COC.

On Thursday a second woman came forward to say she, too, was the victim of sexual harassment.

Lawyer Amelia Salehabadi-Fouques, who is member of the board of directors of Soccer Canada, made the allegations.

“It's not very comfortable for me being public about it, but I cannot let another woman be alone there knowing what I know,” said Salehabadi-Fouques, who is a married mother of three boys.

Salehabadi-Fouques said four years ago, Aubut invited her for a business meeting at the upscale Montreal restaurant Queue de Cheval.

Aubut was more interested in talking about her personal life than the business of sports, she said.

“I was so shocked, because he kissed me. It was outside the restaurant, we were walking out and I was so surprised that I couldn't react. I never in a hundred years thought a man would do that, so I was really under shock, he wanted me to go with him somewhere but I just took a cab and went home,” she said.

Last year, Salehabadi-Fouques said Aubut invited her to a splashy sports gala at a Quebec City hotel, but, she said, Aubut booked her room under his name

“He asked also that he would leave a key for him to come and I expressly forbid that at the desk,” she said.

She also claims Aubut approached her last year at a soccer game. Salehabadi-Fouques said her 15-year-old son was with her at the time, when she claimed Aubut said: “When are you going to sleep with me?”

“I pretended I didn't hear,” she said. “I just kept walking, but my son said, 'Mommy, did I just hear what I heard?’ and I said, ‘Oh my God.’”

Salehabadi-Fouques is the second person to make allegations of sexual harassment against Aubut. Neither person ever filed a complaint with police

“It's your word against his word and he's a very powerful man and people advised me not to do it,” said Salehabadi-Fouques.

None of the allegations have been proven.  

Neither a COC statement nor a statement released by Aubut reveals the nature of the complaint. In his statement, Aubut said he has “learned of allegations concerning remarks he allegedly made to a colleague” and goes on to say that he “never intended to offend or upset anyone by anything he might have said in the performance of his duties.”

The COC says it immediately began an investigation upon receiving the complaint and has hired a former Quebec Superior Court justice to act as an independent investigator.

Aubut, a 67-year-old native of Saint-Hubert-de-Riviere-du-Loup, Que., says he is cooperating with the investigation.

Aubut is a lawyer who served as chief executive officer of the NHL's Quebec Nordiques until the team was moved to Colorado in 1995.

In 2000, he became a member of the COC and was elected to its Board of Directors and Executive Committee in 2005. Aubut was voted president-elect of the COC in March 2009, becoming president in April 2010.

-- with files from The Canadian Press