A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
A Brief Colonial History Of Ceylon(SriLanka)
Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
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Thiranjala Weerasinghe sj.- One Island Two Nations
?????????????????????????????????????????????????Monday, July 17, 2017
Major breakthrough in MiG deal investigation
=The Island Special Report precipitates reopening of probe in Ukraine
= Key witness gives statement to Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office
= Key witness gives statement to Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office
By C.A. Chandraprema-July 16, 2017, 8:42 pm
Following
The Island’s three part Special Report on ‘The Rajapaksa Govt.’s
controversial MiG deal’ in mid-May this year, we reliably learn that the
Ukrainian authorities have reopened their investigation into this
transaction which took place in 2006 between the Sri Lanka Air Force and
the Ukrainian state owned enterprise UKRINMASH. The Financial Crime
Investigation Division (FCID) has said it contacted the Ukrainian
Justice Ministry through the Sri Lankan Justice Ministry and the
Ukrainian authorities informed Sri Lanka by letter dated 24 June 2016
that no contract had been signed between the Sri Lankan Air Force and
UKRIMNASH and that UKRINMASH had not signed any contract with Bellimissa
Holdings either. The FCID has also reported the following facts:
1. The 2006 contract for the supply of four MiG-27s and overhaul of four
other MiG aircraft was signed in two different places with UKRINMASH
and the financier Bellimissa Holdings signing the contract at the
official residence of Udayanga Weeratunga, the Sri Lankan Ambassador in
Russia, and the contracts being thereafter brought to Colombo by
Weeratunga to be signed by the Air Force Commander.
2. Weeratunga brought the 2006 MiG contract to Sri Lanka in
quadruplicate after it had been signed by the representatives of
UKRINMASH and Bellimissa Holdings in Russia. Upon the Air Force
Commander placing his signature on it, he had left one copy with the Air
Force and had taken away the other three copies saying that they had to
be given to UKRINMASH and Bellimissa Holdings.
3. The original contract No: SLAF/2006/07/AIR for the supply of four
MiG-27 aircraft and the overhaul of four other MiG aircraft was in the
possession of the Air Force until 4 June 2009, when it was taken into
the custody of now retired Air Vice Marshall Jayanath Kumarasiri to be
produced as evidence in another case and that it had been in the
possession of this officer until 12 September 2014 when he retired but
that there is no evidence to show that it was handed over to the clerks
in his department when he retired, and that the original copy is now
missing.
4. The FCID also said that the signature of UKRINMASH Director D. A.
Peregudov in the contract appears different to his signature in other
correspondence with the Air Force. The embassy official in Russia who
witnessed the signatures on the 2006 MiG contract has also told the FCID
that he did not know the persons who signed on behalf of UKRINMASH and
Bellimissa Holdings and there appeared to be a difference between the
signature of D. A. Peregudov that in the contract and his earlier
correspondence with the government of Sri Lanka.
Based on the letter received from the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s
Office stating that UKRINMASH had not signed any contracts with the Sri
Lanka Air Force or Belimissa Holdings, and the above facts which came to
light in the course of the investigation, the FCID reported that 2006
contract bearing No: SLAF/2006/07/AIR for the supply of four MiG-27
aircraft and the overhaul of four other MiG aircraft was a forgery,
which Udayanga Weeratunga had presented to the Air Force Commander and
obtained his signature on it through misrepresentation. On this basis,
the FCID held that Weeratunga had committed the offences of forgery,
cheating and the use of forged documents coming under Sections 454, 457,
400 and 459 of the Penal Code and also the dishonest misappropriation
of public property through the falsification of documents which comes
under Section 5 of the Offences Against Public Property Act No: 12 of
1982.
However, back in 2006 when questions were first raised about the MiG
deal by two English newspapers, what was called into question was the
difference in the prices paid for MiG aircraft in 2000 and 2006 and the
fact that in 2006, the purchase money including the transport costs had
been paid to a third party and not directly to the supplier. As we
pointed out in our Special Report on this matter back in May this year,
both these can be quite adequately and satisfactorily explained by
perusing the documentation pertaining to the transaction. Back in 2006,
nobody was even remotely suggesting that this entire contract was a
forgery and that Udayanga Weeratunga had produced a forged document and
defrauded the Sri Lankan state of the money paid for the MiG aircraft.
However, that is the direction in which the FCID investigation went
after the Ukrainian authorities had written to Sri Lanka on 24 June 2016
stating that there was no contract between UKRINMASH and the Sri Lankan
Air Force and no contract between UKRINMASH and the financier of the
transaction Bellimissa Holdings either.
Such
an assertion was quite bizarre given the fact that UKRINMASH had had
many dealings with Sri Lanka since the early 1990s, and four MiGs
belonging to the SL Air Force had been fully overhauled in Ukraine in
2006 under the direct observation of SL Air Force officers who had been
stationed in the UKRINMASH premises for the purpose and four additional
MiG 27s had been bought and delivered and all the aircraft had been very
effectively used in the war and were still in the possession of the Sri
Lanka Air Force. Following our Special Report in mid-May, the Ukrainian
authorities have taken steps to reopen their investigation into the
case of the missing contract documents. The Prosecutor General’s Office
in Ukraine has now obtained a statement from Gennadii Studenikin the
then Deputy Director of UKRINMASH, who had signed the 2006 MiG contract
with Sri Lanka on behalf of D. A. Peregudov, Director of UKRINMASH.
Studenikin, who gave his statement over a period of three days has told
the investigating officer Y. D. Kovalchuk that the agreement among the
Sri Lanka Air Force, UNRINMASH and Bellimissa Holdings bearing number
SLAF/2006/07/AIR signed on 26 July 2006 was a genuine agreement, and
that he had signed it on behalf of UKRINMASH at the residence of the Sri
Lankan ambassador to Russia. He also stated that the agreement had been
signed by other employees of UKRINMASH as witnesses and that an officer
of the Sri Lankan embassy had certified their signatures. Studenikin
has also confirmed that he visited Sri Lanka with a team from UKRINMASH
and negotiated the contract with Air Force officers over a period of two
days. He has stated that he met many officers of the Sri Lanka Air
Force including the Air Force Commander when they visited Ukraine and
several rounds of discussions about this contract took place in Ukraine
as well. He has also referred to the ‘letter of guarantee’ dated 9 June
2006 written by Air Force Commander Donald Perera to UKRINMASH Director
D. A. Peregudov guaranteeing that the contract for the supply of four
MiG-27s and the overhaul of four other MiG aircraft would be signed
before 30 June 2006 and requested them to begin the overhaul of the
planes without waiting for the contract to be signed in view of the
possibility of the resumption of war in Sri Lanka. Studenikin has
further told the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office that he was
involved in work relating to this contract over a period of about three
years.
We learn that the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office will be
interviewing the other employees of UKRINMASH who had anything to do
with this contract in the coming days. The statement given by Gennadii
Studenikin to the effect that there was in fact a contract between
UKRINMASH and the Sri Lanka Air Force which he had negotiated and signed
himself, will have a major impact on the FCID’s present line of
investigation into the MiG deal on the basis that there was no contract
and that forged documents had been used to defraud the Sri Lankan state
of millions of US Dollars.