Cyber theft: CBSL's response to Treasury claims next week | Print Edition

The Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) is expected to respond week to the report submitted by the Finance Ministry to the Committee on Public Finance (CoPF) on the disappearance of USD 2.5 million belonging to the Treasury.

Since the news of the missing funds became public, CBSL and the Finance Ministry have been passing the buck to each other over who is responsible for the missing USD2.5 million. The money meant to be paid as an instalment for a bilateral debt repayment to Australia ended up being diverted to an account of a third party by cybercriminals posing as officials from the Australian Government’s export credit agency – Export Finance Australia (EFA).

The CBSL maintains that it acted solely as the banker to the government in processing debt repayments, while the ministry is of the view that the CBSL has not accorded adequate attention to transactions carrying potential anti-money laundering concerns.

In its defence, the ministry has said CBSL had not provided it with information to identify potential money laundering concerns regarding the fraudulent transaction.

The Finance Ministry claims that the CBSL has taken the position that disclosure of such information may impede the effective execution of government instructions and payment operations. The CBSL’s position is also that at the time the fraudulent transaction with regard to the USD 2.5 million took place, public debt management functions had already been taken over by the Public Debt Management Office (PDMO). (See political column for detailed copy).

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