Media Release 

Foreign Minister Ali Sabry who is on an official visit to the United Kingdom to participate in the 22^nd Commonwealth Foreign Ministers Meeting attended a number of events commemorating the Commonwealth Day on 13 March 2023.

The main event was the Commonwealth Day Service at Westminster Abbey which His Majesty King Charles III, Queen Consort and members of the Royal Family attended. During the service, Chief Sangha Nayaka of Great Britain and Chief Incumbent of London Buddhist Vihara Ven. Dr. Bogoda Seelawimala invoked blessings on the Commonwealth of nations and its peoples on behalf of Buddhists. In commemoration of the 75^th anniversary of Sri Lanka’s independence, the High Commission of Sri Lanka in the UK facilitated Roshani Abbey and Nuwan Hugh Perera, Sri Lankan artistes to perform at the service. The service also featured a procession of young flag bearers representing each of the 56 nations of the Commonwealth, where Thejani Mahadiulwewa carried the Sri Lankan flag.

Foreign Minister Sabry also attended the reception hosted by His Majesty King Charles III at Buckingham Palace on the occasion of the Commonwealth Day. 

Earlier in the day Foreign Minister Sabry participated in the Commonwealth Day ceremonial flag-raising hosted by Speaker of the House of Commons The Right Hon. Sir Lindsay Hoyle at the Palace of Westminster. The minister laid a wreath at the wreath-laying ceremony at the Commonwealth Memorial Gates, to pay tribute to the five million servicemen and women who served in the Armed Forces during the First and Second World Wars, and also participated in the flag-raising event for the Commonwealth Flag for Peace at Marlborough House.

High Commissioner of Sri Lanka to the UK Saroja Sirisena was associated with Foreign Minister Sabry at these events.

High Commission of Sri Lanka

London

Today (15th) trade unions in Colombo Port are also on strike and the media has reported how there was a heated situation between the strikers and Navy officers.

• Letter with clarifications aimed at providing comfort to all and enable SL to progress swiftly to next stage of the debt treatment negotiations
• Reiterates he is committed to stay the course, and says SL relies on creditors to do the right thing
• Woos all to maintain and even enlarge and strengthen official bilateral creditor coordination
• Says new era starts with full implementation of IMF-supported program and resolution of debt situation
• Commits to transparency and assures SL will not make any side arrangements with any creditor aimed at reducing debt treatment impact on that creditor
• Assures not to resume debt service to any creditor unless that creditor agrees on a comprehensive debt treatment in line with IMF-supported program parameters and comparability of treatment principle

President Ranil Wickremesinghe yesterday wrote an open letter to all official bilateral creditors of Sri Lanka with multiple appeals and assurances ahead of next week’s Executive Board consideration and approval of $ 2.9 billion four year Extended Fund Facility (EFF).

The letter contains clarifications aimed at providing comfort to all and enable Sri Lanka’s to progress swiftly to the next stage of the debt treatment negotiations.

Following is the full text of President Wickremesinghe’s open letter.

It was with great satisfaction and sincere hope that I welcomed the announcement made last Tuesday by the Managing Director of the IMF, Kristalina Georgieva, that an IMF Executive Board meeting will be held on 20 March 2023 to consider and hopefully approve the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) arrangement we requested as part of our efforts to restore macroeconomic stability and debt sustainability.

I would like to praise your diligence and express my gratitude to the Paris Club creditors and Japan in particular, and to India and China for enabling the cooperation required to arrive at this point and explicitly delivering IMF compatible financing assurances as well as the other creditor countries which answered the Paris Club creditors’ call to join them. I would also like to thank the Paris Club Secretariat for supporting these efforts.

Since taking office last July, my Government and I have been engaging in good faith with all of you, providing all the necessary information to enable you to make a proper assessment of our debt situation, and the required efforts to close our funding gap and restore debt sustainability. My Government also deployed all efforts to demonstrate our commitment to the EFF program and relentlessly engage on the path to reforms. Our administration has already implemented major reforms by way of prior actions agreed with the IMF.

In the 75 years of Sri Lanka’s independence, there has never been a more critical period for our economic well-being and future development. That is why we have introduced a robust reform agenda aimed at achieving debt sustainability, strengthening governance, widening the social safety nets supporting the most vulnerable and ensuring we can grow an inclusive economy attractive to international business. This is how we will improve the lives of our people and ensure they are first in line to benefit from improvements in our economic conditions.

The IMF-supported program will be critical to achieving this vision for our country. Hence, this new era starts with the full implementation of the IMF-supported program and the resolution of our debt situation with you as long standing partners, as well as with our commercial creditors. There is still a lot of work to be done together. I encourage you to maintain and even enlarge and strengthen official bilateral creditor coordination in the context of our forthcoming engagement. It is the best way of achieving an efficient, transparent and equitable implementation of our debt treatment exercise. For that, I call on the Paris Club bilateral partners, in particular Japan, together with all our other official bilateral partners, including India and China, to garner and foster coordination as you best see fit.

We also understand and acknowledge that we must ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to ensure equitable burden sharing and comparability of treatment. To alleviate any legitimate concern in that regard, there are commitments that we can make to those of you willing to take action ahead of the others.

The first of these commitments, probably the most important one, is transparency. We commit to communicate transparently with all of you on any debt treatment terms that are agreed with any creditor or group of creditors, before being formalised. In the same vein, we commit to report regularly on our indebtedness, ensuring no financial liabilities incurred by the country are undisclosed.

Second, we commit not to resume debt service to any creditor unless that creditor agrees on a comprehensive debt treatment in line with IMF-supported program parameters and the comparability of treatment principle.

Third, we reiterate our commitment to a comparable treatment of all our external creditors, with a view to ensuring all-round equitable burden sharing for all restructured debts. To that end, we will not conclude debt treatment agreements with any official bilateral creditor or any commercial creditor or any group of such creditors on terms more favourable than those agreed under any multilateral platform put forward by our official bilateral creditors. Offering a debt treatment outside of the perimeter set by the debt targets under the IMF program would risk making Sri Lanka’s debt unsustainable again. To this end, we also confirm that we have not and will not make any side arrangements with any creditor aimed at reducing the debt treatment impact on that creditor.

I sincerely hope that these clarifications will provide comfort to all of you and enable us to progress swiftly to the next stage of the debt treatment negotiations. This is paramount for our country. Just as my administration and I have committed to do, we rely on all of you to do the right thin

DAILY FT

The Architects of the new Act. The USD  borrowings under their tenures have ruined Lanka’s Financials for ever.

The government is planing to give their powers lock , stock,  and barrel to the new governing body of CBSL. For a start the monetary and exchange policy, management of official international reserves and issue and manage currency of Sri Lanka with added independence to corporate with public international organizations without the sanction of the Parliament (which includes Asian Development Bank and International Monetary Fund will now be totally in the hands of CBSL.

The new Monetary Policy Board will have powers to formulate monetary policy and implementation of exchange rate regime at its sole discretion, also vested with the discretion to the Governing Board to release Deputy Governors to serve in an office or position of public international financial institutions or non-financial institutions; which provides for the releasing of officers of the Central Bank to serve in public international financial institutions and other entities; which provides for Loans to and from foreign institutions and to act as an agent or correspondent of foreign entities at its discretion.

On the Annual financial statements, even depriving the Parliament of powers to decide with regard to the policies and principles embodies therein; Clause 104 limits the accountability of the Central Bank to the Parliament with discretion to decide in offering its support for the economic policy of the Government. Ironically what the parliament and President must do is to establish a commission and find out why the Central Bank failed in its duties under the current law and hold them accountable for that. The current law gives enough powers and duties to the Central Bank to manage and they still failed.

No accountability and no questions have been asked. The Government should prosecute those in the CBSL who failed and neglected the economy. Whoever negotiated this act on behalf of the government certainly needs his/her head examined. The CBSL is a public institution that is responsible for implementing monetary policy, managing the currency of a country, inflation management , price stability and controlling the money supply. Therefore Debt Management and Bank Supervision must be taken out of the Central Bank, they have failed the country and the people over and over again. This new act will only make it worse for the country. It is therefore certainly worth listening to Former President Rajapakse addressing the CBSL Staff including the incumbent Governor Nandalal Weerasinghe. https://youtu.be/MtiHNpDDzgM . 

Adolf 

According to the exchange rate notes issued by commercial banks today (15), the buying price and selling price of the American dollar has increased further.

Yesterday (14th) the buying price of an American dollar in the Bank of Ceylon was seen as 320 rupees and the selling price as 340 rupees and today those prices are Rs. 326 and Rs.344.

In Sampath Bank, the buying price of an American dollar was seen as 320 rupees and the selling price was seen as 335 rupees, and today the prices have increased respectively to Rs. 330 and to Rs. 345.

Yesterday, the buying price of an American dollar in People’s Bank was Rs. 320.41 and the selling price was Rs. 339.17, and today the prices were recorded as Rs. 325.26 and Rs. 344.31 .

Hatton National Bank’s buying price was Rs. 320 and selling price was Rs. 335 per dollar yesterday, and today the prices are Rs. 327 and Rs. 342.

Yesterday in National Savings Bank, the buying price of one American dollar was Rs. 316.85 and the selling price was Rs. 340.85, and today the prices are Rs. 322.80 and Rs. 344.86 which has been increased.

Minister of Urban Development and Housing Hon. Prasanna Ranatunga instructed the Ministry Secretary recently (10) at the Ministerial Consultative Committee on Urban Development and Housing, to consult with the relevant parties and take a decision regarding the abandoned unfinished buildings in Colombo municipal area. Accordingly, the minister informed to take steps to submit those recommendations to the cabinet.

The Minister instructed this when the Ministerial Consultative Committee on Urban Development and Housing, chaired by the Minister of Urban Development and Housing, Hon. Prasanna Ranatunga, State Ministers, Hon. Arundika Fernando and the Hon. Thenuka Widanagamage, met in Parliament recently (10).

Here, the State Minister Hon. Arundika Fernando pointed out that in Colombo area with high commercial value, abandoned and unfinished buildings such as ‘Krish’ and ‘Hyatt’ are causing a lot of damage. Therefore, it was emphasized in the committee that immediate action should be taken in this regard.

Meanwhile, Minister Hon. Prasanna Ranatunga instructed to the officials to follow some relief program due to the current economic crisis, in collecting the installments from the people who bought the houses of the Housing Development Authority. The minister also advised to take the concessional measures so as not to harm the financial sector of the authority.

The Minister also instructed the officials to arrange for the immediate release of the land belonging to the Coastal Conservation Department (CCD), which can be used for the advancement of the tourism industry, to the relevant investors within the legal framework. It was discussed that it is necessary to provide land for temporary construction for the tourism industry while keeping the right of the land with the department and Bali Islands in Indonesia is a good example for that.

Parliament of Sri Lanka @ParliamentLK @slparliament Parliament of Sri Lanka Accordingly, the Minister also instructed to contact the Ministry of Investment Promotion and carry out related activities.

Members of Parliament Hon. Chandima Weerakkodi, Hon. Upul Mahendra Rajapaksa, Hon. Gunathilaka Rajapaksa, Hon. Jagath Kumara Sumitrarachchi, Hon. Manjula Dissanayake and Hon. Jagath Samarawickrama as well as officers of the institutions under the Ministry of Urban Development and Housing also participated in this meeting.