German legislators mull damage at Mt. Leuser park

Apriadi Gunawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Four visiting representatives of the German parliament expressed concern over environmental damage at the Mount Leuser National Park, located in Aceh near the border with North Sumatra.

Rudolf Krous, chairman of the German parliament's commission for economic cooperation and development, said numerous development projects in the park threatened the area's flora and fauna.

He cited the Ladia Galaska highway project being undertaken by the Nangroe Aceh Darussalam provincial administration, saying the construction would likely disturb the habitat of protected species like the Sumatran tiger and elephants.

The government is constructing a road network through the national park to link southeast Aceh with other regencies.

Rudolf said the parliament would recommend the Indonesian government not support the highway project.

"The German parliament will soon issue letters of recommendation to the Indonesian government not to support or allow the environmental destruction to happen at the national park," he said on Saturday.

The European Union recently expressed its commitment to provide financial assistance to construct an airport to connect the regencies of Aceh with each other and the outside.

Detlef Dzembritzki, deputy of economic cooperation and development in the German parliament, said that if the Ladia Galaska highway project goes forward the provincial administration should review several options to redirect the route to outside of Leuser.

"We have surveyed the Leuser area from the air for about two- and-a-half hours in southeast Aceh, which is undergoing a conservation project. However, we are dissatisfied to see environmental damage in several areas of the park," he said.

Irvan, the head of institutional capacity development at the Leuser park management unit, said environmental damage in Leuser had reached a critical point.

He said that aside from the Ladia Galaska project, much of the environmental damage was caused by illegal logging by the local community.

"The environmental damage in Leuser has now reached some 34,000 hectares per annum. Much of the damage is evident in eastern and southeast Aceh," Ivan told The Jakarta Post.