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Cabraal assures all debt repayments will be made 

18 Mar 2022

BY Dinitha Rathnayake  Amidst an economic crisis and the dwindling of foreign reserves, Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) Governor Ajith Nivard Cabraal, in a written response to a query made by The Morning, assured that Sri Lanka will fulfil all of its debt obligations. “Earlier, these same people said that we will be bankrupt on 18 January 2022. In fact, they have been making similar warnings since 2020 onwards. Ask them what happened to their previous predictions,” he said. Sri Lanka had $ 6.9 billion worth of debt repayments due in 2022, mostly in international sovereign bonds (ISBs) at the beginning of the year. However, $ 1 billion of that was paid on 18 January. This repayment was highly controversial as several prominent economic minds of Sri Lanka urged the Government to restructure the debt and save that $ 1 billion for domestic needs such as importing essentials, such as medicines, food, and fuel. Fuel shortages due to the foreign exchange crisis have heavily impacted the Sri Lankan public, leaving them in lengthy fuel lines for several hours per day. Yesterday, long queues were seen for both petrol and diesel, with some fuel pumping stations remaining closed, after having run out of stocks. Furthermore, there have been regular LPG shortages as well as electricity outages due to the lack of foreign exchange for these vital imports. Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa emphasised earlier in the year that the Government has the ability to repay all its debt as planned. He pointed out that Sri Lanka has so far repaid the loans properly without any delay and that the present Government is ready to repay the loan instalments and interest on time in the future as well. The Finance Minister also stated that relief given to the people of the country and development activities will never be hampered while repaying the loans. 


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