{"id":43721,"date":"2015-05-09T08:08:29","date_gmt":"2015-05-09T15:08:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=43721"},"modified":"2015-05-09T08:08:29","modified_gmt":"2015-05-09T15:08:29","slug":"mangalas-claim-prompts-mr-to-seek-legal-advice-usd-18-billion-stashed-overseas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/05\/09\/mangalas-claim-prompts-mr-to-seek-legal-advice-usd-18-billion-stashed-overseas\/","title":{"rendered":"Mangala\u2019s claim prompts MR to seek legal advice  \u2018USD 18 Billion stashed overseas\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em>Courtesy: Island<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Denying accusations that he had stashed away funds amounting to USD 18 billion, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa yesterday said that legal advice would be sought as regards the defamatory statement attributed to Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera.<\/p>\n<p>Minister Samaraweera on Thursday claimed that the new government had been working closely with four countries to trace funds stashed overseas. The minister declined to name the countries or foreign agencies involved in the operation.<\/p>\n<p>The following is the full text of the statement titled \u2018USD 18 billion belonging to the Rajapaksa family\u2019 issued by the former President:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Foreign minister Mangala Samaraweera said at a press conference on Thursday that information has been received from foreign intelligence agencies that I, my wife, sons and brothers had amassed a fortune of 18 billion US dollars concealed in secret offshore accounts and front companies overseas.<\/p>\n<p>There was a time when any large house that was being built in Colombo or a hotel that was being built anywhere in the country was supposed to belong to members of my family. Such propaganda cannot be carried out now, so our political opponents have resorted to talking about money stashed overseas.<\/p>\n<p>In making that statement about my family\u2019s supposed USD 18 billion fortune, minister Samaraweera took the precaution of adding that he does not know whether the information they have received is correct or not. Covering oneself in that manner enables fiction to be passed off as fact. When the foreign minister makes such statements, the story is picked up even by foreign news agencies. These are the devious means by which false propaganda against me and members of my family is being disseminated. I would like to inform the public once again that neither I nor my wife and sons nor my brothers have secret offshore accounts or illegal overseas investments in front companies. Legal advice will be sought on the statement made by minister Samaraweera.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Courtesy: Island Denying accusations that he had stashed away funds amounting to USD 18 billion, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa yesterday said that legal advice would be sought as regards the defamatory statement attributed to Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera. Minister Samaraweera on Thursday claimed that the new government had been working closely with four countries to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43721"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43721\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}