Russia's VEB Bank stops payment of Rooppur project amid SWIFT ban
Russia's Bank for Development and Foreign Economic Affairs (VEB) has ordered halting payments for Bangladesh's Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant project as SWIFT put sanctions on some Russian banks.
SWIFT is a Belgium-based secure messaging platform that facilitates cross-border payments.
VEB had recently sent a letter to Bangladesh Bank asking them to stop transactions with the Russian bank from March 1, a senior official of Bangladesh Bank told The Business Standard on condition of anonymity.
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Additionally, a few other Russian banks have also asked multiple banks in Bangladesh to stop transactions with them.
The central bank official said that Russia is providing loan assistance in the construction of Rooppur nuclear power plant in Bangladesh and at the same time the project is being implemented by a contractor led by Rosatom State Atomic Energy Corporation.
Repayment of some part of the loan of this project has begun and it was being done through Sonali Bank.
Also, the Russian workers who are working in Bangladesh were also being paid by sending money through the banks.
However, the SWIFT ban has led those Russian banks to stop all transactions.
Russia is now sending money for machinery through brokers rather than sending it directly to Bangladesh.
Sonali Bank Managing Director MD Ataur Rahman told The Business Standard, "Russia's VEB Bank had sent us a letter to stop the payment of Rooppur nuclear power plant project. We have reported the matter to the Central Bank."
"The central bank sent its instructions to the concerned department of our bank yesterday afternoon, but I do not know what the decision was," he added.
VEB also has business relations with the state-owned Agrani Bank. On 28 February, the Russian bank sent a letter to Agrani Bank to suspend all transactions.
It may be mentioned that the cost of construction of two units of 1200 MW in Rooppur project is about Tk114,000 crore. Of this, the Government of Bangladesh will finance Tk22,053 crore and Russia is providing loan assistance of Tk 91,040 crore.
The power plant is scheduled to start supplying electricity by 2024.
SWIFT on 2 March added a few other financial organisations, including to Belarusian banks, to its list of sanctions in addition to the seven Russian banks it initially sanctioned.
