Indonesia fights to clean up ‘the world’s most polluted river’, Java's Citarum

An aerial view of the Citarum River shows the amount of waste in it. — ALGI FEBRI SUGITA/Zuma Press Wire/dpa

Wida Widiarti has spent her entire life near the Citarum River on Indonesia’s main island of Java.

That means she has witnessed first-hand how the river mutated from an important lifeline into a disgusting symbol of extreme environmental pollution.