COLOMBO, Aug. 5 -- Sri Lanka's government on Wednesday (5) rejected Opposition allegations that the loss of US$2.5 million during a foreign debt repayment was caused by failures in public debt management, insisting the incident was the result of an online fraud and not a technical lapse in the country's debt repayment process.

Deputy Minister of Media Kausalya Ariyaratne made the remarks in Parliament during the adjournment debate on the disappearance of US$2.5 million transferred by the Treasury to a foreign recipient.

Ariyaratne said the government's debt repayment operations had been carried out as planned and without technical errors.

"The loss of US$2.5 million was the result of an online fraud. We completely reject the Opposition...