Colombo, Sri Lanka: Sri Lankan anti-graft officials said Friday they had arrested the former head of the national airline on charges of conspiring to accept bribes from Airbus over a multi-million-dollar deal.
Kapila Chandrasena, who was CEO of SriLankan Airlines during a 2013 deal to purchase 10 aircraft worth $2.3 billion, was arrested on Thursday and remanded in custody, officials said.
"He conspired to accept a bribe of $16 million and received 1.45 million euros into a bank account in Singapore," an official of Sri Lanka's Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption said.
Prosecutors say Chandrasena created a shell company in Brunei in his wife's name and arranged for the kickback to be paid into its Singapore account.
Sri Lanka's national carrier is saddled with debt, with estimated accumulated losses of 596 billion rupees ($1.9 billion) at the end of March last year. Attempts to sell the airline have so far failed to attract a buyer.
Chandrasena was previously arrested and released on bail in February 2020 in a similar but separate case.
