The Police Financial Crimes Investigation Division has gone to the Matara Magistrate’s Court to stop the use of a one-and-a-half-acre property at Browns Hill, Matara, that it alleges was bought by former minister Basil Rajapaksa with illicitly earned money.
The FCID filed a motion before Magistrate Chathura Dissanayake invoking provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, NewsFirst reported on Tuesday afternoon.
Granted, or only sought?
The three filings do not agree on what the court actually did.
| NewsFirst | Daily Mirror | Hiru News | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Status | steps “taken to suspend the use” | FCID “to seek suspension”; court to consider submissions “in due course” | FCID “obtained an order” |
| Claims window | not reported | not reported | 14 days for rival ownership claims |
| Magistrate named | Chathura Dissanayake | not named | not named |
The Daily Mirror’s account is the most cautious: it says the FCID “has informed the Matara Magistrate’s Court that steps will be taken” to suspend use, and that “the court is expected to consider the relevant submissions in due course.” Hiru News reports the opposite — that the division obtained an order, and that the court granted 14 days for any other party holding ownership rights to come forward with a claim.
That 14-day window is the detail that tips the balance. A claims period is something a court sets when it makes an order, not when it is asked for one, and no other outlet carries it. On the available reporting the safer reading is that the court has acted and set a two-week window for competing claims — but only one of three outlets says so, and readers should treat the point as unresolved.
What the property is
The land is an approximately one-and-a-half-acre plot on Eliyakanda Road, Browns Hill, Matara. The Daily Mirror adds details the other two filings do not carry: the property was reportedly used for coconut cultivation and had previously been owned by a German national identified as Herbert Keller, before being bought by Rajapaksa for about Rs. 60 million.
That purchase price matches the figure in the underlying case. The Matara Chief Magistrate’s Court reissued an arrest warrant against Rajapaksa in July over the alleged purchase of the same 1.5-acre Eliyakanda Road property for Rs. 60 million, after he again failed to appear.
The INTERPOL notice has still not issued
The more consequential line in Tuesday’s reporting is a single clause. NewsFirst says authorities “are also taking steps to obtain an Interpol Blue Notice against Basil Rajapaksa after he allegedly failed to appear before court.”
Seventeen days earlier, Public Security Minister Ananda Wijepala said a Blue Notice had been issued. Our coverage on 19 September set that claim against a senior police officer’s account that INTERPOL had come back asking Sri Lanka for further information first, and advised readers to treat the notice as sought and pending rather than in force.
That article’s open question — whether the notice had actually issued — now has an answer by implication. A notice described on 6 October as something authorities are “taking steps to obtain” has not issued. The minister’s September statement was, on NewsFirst’s current account, premature.
No filing says what INTERPOL has asked for, how long the request has been outstanding, or why it has not been granted.
Bail money already forfeited
The court ordered the confiscation of Rajapaksa’s bail money on 18 August after he failed to appear in the case, NewsFirst reports — a sanction that precedes both the property motion and the INTERPOL request, and the first time our coverage has carried that date.
A Blue Notice, for the avoidance of doubt, is an information-gathering alert used to establish a person’s identity, location or activities in connection with an investigation. It is not an arrest warrant and confers no power of detention. The instrument that asks another jurisdiction to detain someone pending extradition is a Red Notice, and no outlet reports that one has been sought.
Not reported
No filing says whether the suspension order, if made, bars sale and transfer as well as use, or who is currently occupying or working the land. None says whether Herbert Keller or his estate is among the parties the 14-day window is addressed to, or whether the other accused in the Matara case — who include Ayoma Galappaththi, a sister of Rajapaksa’s wife — have any claim to the property.
None reports which country Rajapaksa is understood to be in, whether an extradition request has been lodged anywhere, or whether the Rs. 7.8 million Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau T-shirt matter that forms the second outstanding warrant against him is affected by Tuesday’s motion.
Ada Derana filed on the property order too, but its site has returned a CloudFront block for 14 consecutive days and that report could not be retrieved.
