COLOMBO, March 13 — Sri Lankan anti-graft officials said today 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 US$2.3 billion (RM9 billion), was arrested yesterday and remanded in custody, officials said.
“He conspired to accept a bribe of US$16 million and received €1.45 million 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 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.
At that time, the United States, Britain and France named him in a joint investigation into Airbus business deals.
In January 2020, a French court approved a fine of €3.6 billion to be paid by the European aircraft manufacturer to France, Britain and the United States to settle the probes.
Investigators in Britain accused Airbus of failing to prevent persons associated with the company from bribing directors or employees of SriLankan Airlines to “obtain or retain business or advantage”.
In June 2025, Nishantha Wickramasinghe, who was chairman of SriLankan Airlines when the carrier contracted to buy the 10 aircraft in 2013 — was arrested in an unrelated corruption case.
Wickramasinghe was accused of bankrolling his brother‑in‑law, then‑president Mahinda Rajapaksa, in a failed bid for re‑election. That case is still pending. — AFP
