COLOMBO, Sept 4 (Reuters) – The son of Sri Lanka’s former president Mahinda Rajapaksa has been arrested and remanded until September 18 on graft charges linked to purchases of Airbus planes by national carrier SriLankan Airlines, a top court said on Friday.
Namal Rajapaksa, who is a lawmaker representing the opposition Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna, was arrested following more than five hours of questioning by Sri Lanka’s key anti-graft body, the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption. The order to remand him was issued by Colombo Chief Magistrate Asanga S. Bodaragama.
Rajapaksa has consistently denied wrongdoing. His lawyers were not immediately available for comment.
His arrest is part of an ongoing investigation into a multi-million-dollar purchase of planes from European manufacturer Airbus in 2013. A delegation from Airbus was in Colombo in August to assist with the investigations.
Airbus reached a deal with French, British and U.S. authorities in 2020 after a three-year probe into allegations of bribery and corruption over jetliner sales. It was handed a $4 billion fine to settle the case.
SriLankan Airlines and Airbus did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
(Reporting by Uditha Jayasinghe, writing by Shilpa Jamkhandikar, Editing by Tomasz Janowski and Sharon Singleton)
