| |
JAKARTA : Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has pledged to take firm action against those responsible for forest fires which are producing a choking haze smothering Malaysia, his spokesman said Friday.
Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi telephoned Yudhoyono on Wednesday to discuss the haze crisis and offered Indonesia help to tackle the problem, said presidential spokesman Dino Patti Jalal.
The president told Abdullah "that the government would do all it can and utilise local and national apparatuses to put out the forest fires," Jalal told AFP.
"Firm action will be taken against those responsible," he said, quoting the president, adding that apart from farmers' practice of clearing land using fire, hot, dry weather was also a major factor contributing to the blazes.
Malaysia on Thursday declared a state of emergency in some areas as the air pollution index soared due to choking haze blown across the Malacca Strait from forest fires on Indonesia's Sumatra island.
Indonesian Forestry Minister Malam Sambat Kaban and Malaysian Environment Minister Adenan Satem met in the city of Medan on Sumatra to discuss the crisis.
The two sides agreed to cooperate on preventing people using fire to clear land and to carry out cloud-seeding to induce rain.
Anger was mounting in Malaysia over the fires, an annual event at this time of year as farmers use the dry season to burn forests and clear land.
With visibility in places down to 200 metres (660 feet) or less, Kuala Lumpur's second airport was closed until further notice while the Malacca Strait, one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, has become hazardous.
Hundreds of schools in Kuala Lumpur and surrounding districts were ordered to close until Monday because of the worsening haze, which is causing a rise in asthma attacks and respiratory conditions.
Indonesian officials said hundreds of rangers had been deployed but were being hampered by the remote locations of the fires and a lack of water.
Satellite images taken Wednesday showed 993 fires in Riau and North Sumatra provinces on Sumatra, said Israr Albar, a forestry ministry official in charge of forest fires.
Most fires were caused by land-clearing by farmers and were not in the forests, forestry ministry officials said.
In 1997 and 1998, choking haze caused mainly by Indonesian forest fires enveloped parts of Southeast Asia, including Malaysia, for months. - AFP /ch
|
