Oct 13, Colombo: Sri Lanka's main opposition United National Party (UNP) says the Central Bank decided to invest monies in Greek Bonds without receiving the proper approval from the Monetary Board.

UNP parliamentarian Dr. Harsha de Silva has said that the Central Bank had invested the monies in the bonds in violation of normal regulations and incurred a Rs. 2 billion loss.

He has noted that the Central Bank had invested Rs. 3.4 billion in Greek Bonds when rating institutions had said Greece was not a suitable place to invest money.

He has added that the government had not responded to his questions on the investments in Greek Bonds.

According to Dr. de Silva, although the government had said the matter cannot be debated in parliament since it was before the Supreme Court, it was yet a petition and that parliament could therefore debate the investment.

Speaker of the Sri Lankan parliament Chamal Rajapaksa disallowed an adjournment motion by the MP from being debated in the House since debating the motion in parliament while a petition before the Supreme Court was filed would be sub judice.

The government in 2011 has lost US$ 6.6 million from the investment in Greek bonds. The Central Bank however, said the investments in Greek Bonds were a small fraction of its total Europe portfolio and the loss of the Greek bonds was comfortably offset by higher returns from other investments.