Sascha Wil­son

Ban­dits tun­nelled their way in­to the Re­pub­lic Bank branch op­po­site the Cou­va Po­lice Sta­tion over the long week­end. 

Po­lice did not dis­close what was stolen if any­thing. 

The ban­dits re­port­ed­ly made a hole in the wall at the back of the build­ing in which the bank is sit­u­at­ed while a sec­ond hole was dis­cov­ered un­der an­oth­er build­ing on the same com­pound. 

Po­lice re­ceived a call about the break-in short­ly be­fore 8 am and were told by bank of­fi­cials that the bank would have been se­cured on Fri­day. None of the tools used in the break-in was found at the scene.

Mean­while, Gen­er­al Man­ag­er of Group Mar­ket­ing and Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Karen Tom Yew-Jar­dine con­firmed the break-in but did not dis­close any de­tails about how en­try was gained. She al­so de­clined to say whether any­thing was stolen. How­ev­er, Yew-Jar­dine as­sured that cus­tomers' files were not com­pro­mised and the cash vault was not breached.

Mean­while, in a state­ment, the bank stat­ed that an in­ves­ti­ga­tion has been launched in­to the in­ci­dent and they are co­op­er­at­ing ful­ly with the au­thor­i­ties.   "We can con­firm that all cus­tomers’ records and files re­main se­cured and the branch’s cash vault was not breached. 

As this is an on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tion, the Bank will be lim­it­ing any fur­ther state­ment on this mat­ter at this time," the bank stat­ed.  Cou­va po­lice are in­ves­ti­gat­ing.