Environment ministers from Singapore, Malaysia and other regional nations affected by smoke haze met yesterday in Indonesia to search for ways to combat an annual problem that disrupts travel and leads to health problems.
The ministers from Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Brunei held talks in Pekanbaru, the capital of Riau Province, an area of Sumatra island badly affected by the raging fires.
Indonesia's neighbors have become increasingly frustrated over Jakarta's inability to deal with the annual dry season blazes, which in the past few weeks have caused serious air pollution across the region, particularly in Malaysia and Singapore.
"We are asking for assistance in terms of equipment or expertise. We will see what they can offer to us," Indonesian Forestry Minister Malam Sambat Kaban told reporters.
Kaban said Indonesia expected its neighbors to recognize that the problem was not a simple one to fix.
"That's why we will take them for a field trip on Saturday [today] so that they can see for themselves the situation," he said.
The fires, often started deliberately by farmers or big plantation businesses, have been burning for weeks in parts of Indonesia, creating a choking haze that has made many ill, shut airports and threatened wildlife in protected forests.
Kaban said more than 75 percent of the fires were not in government-controlled forests but in plantations and farms belonging to private companies and local people.
He said that central Kalimantan on the Indonesian part of Borneo island was the worst hit, with around 1 million hectares of peat land in one area affected. Peat fires are particularly hard to put out and can burn for months.
"This is where most smoke came from," Kaban said.
Outside a hotel where senior officials were meeting to flesh out details for the ministerial meeting, about 20 environmental activists in face masks held a protest over the fires.
"Business people are receiving special treatment from the government while the people here and in neighboring countries are suffering from the haze. This environmental disaster is an embarrassment for Indonesia," Johnny Mundong, head of the environmental group WALHI, told reporters.
Visibility in some areas of Indonesia was cut to 30m last week, forcing cars to use headlights, although there was only a slight haze over Pekanbaru yesterday.
Under pressure from its neighbors, Indonesia said on Thursday it would ratify a Southeast Asian agreement that calls for regional cooperation to deal with the forest fires.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese