COLOMBO: Sri Lanka on Friday appointed a four-member foreign experts panel to conduct an autopsy of a senior government official who was found dead at his residence weeks after he was suspended from his job.
According to the police, the official, Rangana Nishantha Rajapaksa, 48, is suspected to have committed suicide in his house at Kuliyapitiya in the northwest region.
Rajapaksa's body was found with cut injuries in the backyard of his house, the police said.
He was posted as an Assistant Director at the External Resources Department of the Ministry of Finance.
He was among six officials suspended in March in connection with the loss of USD 2.5 million allegedly linked to the hacking of the Finance Ministry account -- a case in which an investigation is underway.
Sri Lanka’s main opposition Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) last week turned the heat on the government over the loss of funds caused by the alleged hacking.
Secretary to the Treasury Harshana Suriyapperuma has confirmed that USD 2.5 million from the Treasury account was hacked in connection with a foreign debt repayment to Australia in January.
This was a part payment of a larger USD 22.9 million debt settlement.
Sri Lanka recovered from an economic crisis around four years ago when the country almost entirely ran out of foreign exchange, leading to external debt default worth billions of dollars.