{"id":49482,"date":"2015-11-16T23:29:00","date_gmt":"2015-11-17T05:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=49482"},"modified":"2015-11-16T05:46:42","modified_gmt":"2015-11-16T12:46:42","slug":"sri-lanka-ventures-into-money-laundering-to-overcome-balance-of-payment-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2015\/11\/16\/sri-lanka-ventures-into-money-laundering-to-overcome-balance-of-payment-crisis\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka Ventures into Money Laundering to Overcome Balance of Payment Crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em> Dilrook Kannangara<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Tough times call for tough measures. That is exactly what the debt ridden Lankan government has done. Money laundering is the latest state sponsored industry in the island nation. A few weeks ago, the finance minister appealed to locals and foreigners with Swiss bank accounts to move their accounts to Sri Lanka with the promise of a higher US dollar interest rate (2% to 3% higher in dollar terms). Depositors will not be asked any questions.<\/p>\n<p>According to the government, the response has been encouraging. Already $450 million has been deposited in Sri Lankan banks. The debt-ridden nation is playing a very dangerous game of money laundering similar to what BCCI (Bank of Credit and Commerce International) did in the 1970s and 1980s. This may result in Sri Lankan banks being classified as money laundering dens; a pariah state of illicit banking practices shunned by other countries. Of particular note is the claim that among the depositors are Saudis and Qataris. A number of international bodies have highlighted the role some Saudis and Qataris play in financing AQ and ISIS terror operations. Moving funds to Sri Lanka may facilitate increased radicalisation of South Asia using its underdeveloped financial monitoring mechanisms.<\/p>\n<p>Black money earned through narcotics, human trafficking, international prostitution rings and illicit weapons trade will be laundered into white money in Sri Lanka. The cost of servicing this new unofficial debt is colossal. Paying 2% to 3% more than the dollar rate will cost taxpayers over $20 million a year and interest is compounded annually. This is certainly not good governance. It is brash and negligent, and even potentially illegal. Sri Lanka is thrown from the frying pan to the fire.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dilrook Kannangara Tough times call for tough measures. That is exactly what the debt ridden Lankan government has done. Money laundering is the latest state sponsored industry in the island nation. A few weeks ago, the finance minister appealed to locals and foreigners with Swiss bank accounts to move their accounts to Sri Lanka with [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dilrook-kannangara"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49482","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=49482"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49482\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}