Court directed to prevent sale of Udayanga's properties found by FCID

By Shehan Chamika Silva

Fort Magistrate Lanka Jayaratne today made a direction to prevent possible sale of Udayanga Weeratunga's properties found by FCID recently.

The direction was made to Aththanagalle land registrar over two properties found in Dompe area and Colombo land registrar over an apartment identified in Trillium residencies Borella.

The FCID on the last ocassion informed Court that it had identified over Rs. 70 million worth properties belonging to former ambassador Udayanga Weerathunga in Sri Lanka during the inquiry conducted into financial lost caused to the government when purchasing four Ukraine- built MIG 27 aircrafts in 2006.

Filing a further report in Court, FCID IP Nihal Francis revealed about two lands - 7 acres in extent worth of Rs. 40 million and 1 acre land worth of Rs. 5 million in Dompe area- and a luxury apartment (Trillium Residencies) owned by Mr. Weeratunga in Borella area worth of Rs. 25 million.

The FCID sought court direction on the land registrar to prevent possible sale of those identified properties immediately.

In the meantime, acceding the FCID’s request the Magistrate permitted the prosecution to obtain certain bank details from several banks regarding a suspicious fund transaction of Udayanga Weeratunaga amounting to Rs. 20 million.