KL ready to help RI battle forest fires
KL ready to help RI battle forest fires
Agencies, Kuala Lumpur
Malaysian firefighters have been put on alert to help combat hundreds of fires raging out of control in Indonesia and sending plumes of smoke billowing across nearby countries, news reports said on Sunday.
The Malaysian government would dispatch firefighters to Indonesian territories worst hit by blazes, mainly parts of Kalimantan province on Borneo island, if Indonesian authorities make a request, said Malaysian Deputy Housing and Local Government Minister Peter Chin.
"We are waiting for a directive ... so that our firemen can help them fight the fires there," Chin was quoted as saying by the Sunday Star newspaper.
The out-of-control fires -- set by farmers, plantation owners and loggers to clear land -- have raged on Indonesia's portion of Borneo and Sumatra islands since the beginning of August.
Cash-strapped local authorities say they are forced to depend on poorly trained volunteers, many of whom fight the blazes with only pick axes and leaky hoses.
Smoky haze from the fires has forced flight delays in Indonesia, school closures and sent hundreds of residents to hospitals because of respiratory ailments.
The haze has also swathed several parts of neighboring Malaysia and Singapore. Visibility in Kuching, the capital of Malaysia's Sarawak state on Borneo island, plunged to 0.8 kilometer (0.5 mile) on Sunday, the meteorological department reported.
Singapore's National Environmental Agency, which uses satellites to monitor fires in the region, said "hot spots", already numbering in the hundreds, have increased significantly in recent days.
Malaysia's Bernama news agency said a team of Malaysian experts would visit Kalimantan next week following a meeting between the country's Science, Technology and Environment Minister Law Hieng Ding and his Indonesian counterpart Nabiel Makarim at this month's Earth Summit in South Africa.
"I will meet my counterpart, Nabiel Makarim, in Pontianak on September 27 to discuss related issues ahead of a Malaysian team which will be brought to the site concerned," Law told Bernama.
Pontianak is the capital of West Kalimantan province, where hundreds of people had been treated as a result of the smoke that polluted the air and water.
Periods of smoke or haze, which blanketed parts of Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore in 1997 and 1998, cost the regional economies $9 billion, mainly in agriculture, transportation and tourism.
Conservationists have long criticized Jakarta for failing to protect its natural resources. Indonesia admits its laws are too weak to deal with the problem and is promising reform.