Foreign exchange fraud probe sought as Ravi Karunanayake urges COPF to summon Central Bank officials over a one billion dollar racket in Sri Lanka.
Foreign exchange fraud worth one billion US dollars must be investigated immediately, Parliamentarian Ravi Karunanayake has said, after President Anura Kumara Dissanayake revealed the alleged racket and its scale.
Karunanayake has requested that the relevant regulatory authorities be summoned before Parliament’s Committee on Public Finance (COPF), arguing that the matter requires urgent scrutiny at the highest level.
In a letter addressed to the Chairman of the Committee on Public Finance, the MP stated that the financial fraud represents a grave incident capable of shaking the country’s economic foundation.
The fraud, which has allegedly been operating since 2024, was earlier revealed by the President as a scheme conducted through a network of “Phantom Imports.” Under this method, money was sent overseas by submitting forged documents without any actual import of goods.
Public Security Minister Ananda Wijepala has also confirmed that Rs. 12.89 billion was sent abroad through 953 illegal transactions carried out via 105 shell companies in the country.
Karunanayake has sharply questioned the role of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka in the financial crime. In his letter, he asked why the Bank Supervision Department and the Financial Intelligence Unit of the Central Bank remained silent while such a massive sum was moved out of the country for two years through 26,108 fraudulent Telegraphic Transfers (TT) across 227 accounts in 13 commercial banks.
The MP has proposed that the Governor and senior officials of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, the Controller General of Imports and Exports, the Director General of Customs, and the Chief Compliance Officers of the 13 commercial banks identified as being involved in the fraud be summoned before the committee immediately to examine this systemic breakdown.
Karunanayake further emphasized that this disaster occurred because the Central Bank failed to give proper attention to his 2025 warnings on tax evasion and foreign exchange fraud through unregulated financial instruments such as cryptocurrency.
