COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s top judge attended parliament on Friday for the start of a process, in which she is expected to be impeached over alleged financial misconduct, witnesses and officials said.

Chief Justice Shirani Banda-ranayake, 54, left the Superior Court’s complex and drove to the national parliament accompanied by a lawyer to face an 11-member parliamentary committee probing 14 charges of financial and official misconduct.

The lawmakers are pressing ahead with the hearing despite a non-binding Supreme Court order for parliament to delay while legal challenges to the impeachment process are heard.

The impeachment move followed a Supreme Court decision last month that effectively scuppered a bill giving more powers to the economic development minister, who is the president’s younger brother.

Bandaranayake, whose husband was also charged with corruption, while holding a political appointment as the head of a state-owned bank, denied the allegation.