Will the lost US$81 million ever be found?
“The Senate blue ribbon committee on Tuesday, March 15, rejected requests for an executive session of its hearing on the alleged laundering of $81 million stolen from the Central Bank of Bangladesh, saying the true owner of the funds has not invoked confidentiality,” reports Maila Ager on Inquirer.net.
Senator TG Guingona, chairman of the committee, disclosed that there were two requests for an executive session. However, he didn’t identify who made the requests.
Guingona was quoted as saying, “I can’t agree to that. First of all because the subject funds actually belonged to the Bangladesh government and the Bangladesh government has not invoked confidentiality. In fact, they are here present to observe. They have written the Bangko Sentral Governor asking for assistance for the tracing and the recovery of funds.”
He further emphasized, “So the true owner is the one that can invoke the secrecy of bank deposits but in this case, the true owner is asking our assistance so the invocation of the bank secrecy law can’t be properly done at this point.”
The report noted that “the court has already issued a freeze order on the bank accounts involved.”
