JAKARTA: Indonesia President Prabowo Subianto said authorities will revoke the permits of companies found to be responsible for the forest fires that have left a Malaysian city with the world’s worst air pollution.
Police and prosecutors are investigating the blazes and "if there are indications that any corporation ordered the burning, we will revoke all of its permits,” Prabowo said during his visit to Sumatra on Monday (Aug 24).
A thick blanket of smoke from the fires raging across Kalimantan, the Indonesian part of Borneo, drifted into neighbouring Malaysia, where Kuching recorded the poorest air quality among the world’s major cities on Monday, according to the Swiss monitor IQAir. The cross-border crisis has prompted Malaysia and Brunei to seek a diplomatic route at a regional level to address the worsening haze.
The number of hotspots in Indonesia has reached 5,102 this month, the highest number for August in data that stretches through 2015, according to the Forestry Ministry’s fire-monitoring platform SiPongi.
Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore are also among the cities with the worst air today, according to IQAir.
Singapore’s National Environment Agency said it noticed an escalation in hotspot and smoke haze activity over the weekend. The agency is closely monitoring the overall air quality as the 24-hour Pollutant Standards Index climbed to 90 in the central area of Singapore. A measure above 100 is considered as unhealthy.
While forest fires are a seasonal occurrence across much of South-East Asia, lack of precipitation and hotter temperatures brought by the El Niño weather pattern heightened the risk of more widespread and longer lasting emergencies.
Prabowo visited Kalimantan over the weekend before traveling to Sumatra on Monday, where there are also widespread blazes. The government said that four companies in West Kalimantan are under investigation over violations linked to the fires. It hasn’t identified the firms. - Bloomberg
