Lanka girls from ‘unimaginable’ backgrounds driven to sex trade by currency crisis: ex-President

ECONOMYNEXT –Sri Lanka’s latest currency collapse is driving girls in to the sex trade in a phenomenon which was difficult to imagine, given their family backgrounds, ex-President Maithripala Sirisena said as inflation topped 70 percent after two years of money printing to keep rates down.

Due to current economic conditions social problems were worsening, he said.

“Girl children (gahanu daruwan) from unimaginable (hithun-ner-wuth beri) families are turning to prostitution in a large scale according to what police officials tell us,” ex-President Sirisena told the media at the SLFP headquarters.

Sri Lanka’s rupee collapsed from 182 to 360 to the US dollar after two years of money printing to suppress rates to stimulate the economy.

Out-migration as well as prostitution are routine trends seen in countries with Sri Lanka style central banks in Latin America whose currencies collapse steeply analysts have warned when the country started on on a devaluationist path.