- Investigations still ongoing: CIABOC
Investigations into several complaints filed against Thirukumar Nadesan, the husband of former Deputy Minister of Water Supply and Drainage Nirupama Rajapaksa, have revealed evidence of money laundering, which has been forwarded to the Criminal Investigation Department (CID).
Speaking to The Sunday Morning Business, Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) Director of Investigations Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Nuwan Asanka stated that their investigations into the bribery allegations against Rajapaksa and Nadesan were still ongoing.
The two had been implicated in the Pandora Papers file leak in connection with several suspicious transactions, including the maintenance of large cash deposits.
He further revealed: “Our investigations revealed some evidence regarding possible money laundering, which does not fall within the scope of our authority. Therefore, we have forwarded the same to the Financial Intelligence Unit of the CID for investigations. We will continue to investigate all matters that fall under the Bribery Act. The usual practice is to forward any facts or evidence revealed in our investigations which are not related to bribery to the respective related agency.”
While declining to comment on any specifics revealed by the CIABOC investigation on the bribery charges levelled against Rajapaksa and Nadesan, Asanka stated that the CIABOC was currently reexamining all evidence collected and ensuring the authenticity of said evidence.
The CIABOC investigation into Rajapaksa and Nadesan commenced in the aftermath of the release of the Pandora Papers, which refers to 11.9 million leaked documents with 2.9 terabytes of data that the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) published beginning on 3 October 2021.
The documents allege the couple’s involvement in shell companies (inactive companies used as vehicles for various financial manoeuvres or kept dormant for future use in some other capacity) located in tax havens, which had obtained lucrative consulting contracts from foreign companies doing business with the Government of Sri Lanka.
The papers said that in confidential emails to Asiaciti Trust, a Singapore-based offshore services provider, a longtime adviser of Nadesan’s had put his overall wealth as of 2011 at more than $ 160 million. However, ICIJ could not independently verify the figure.