Stop blaming RI for haze: Anwar

Stop blaming RI for haze: Anwar

KUALA LUMPUR (Agencies): The deputy prime minister called on Malaysians yesterday to stop blaming Indonesia for the eye- burning smog that has blanketed Southeast Asia.

While acknowledging the haze had affected public health and could harm the economies of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) members, Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said the problem must be handled in a way that won't jeopardize Malaysia's relations with Indonesia.

"We realize that the solution lies not in pointing the finger, but in the ASEAN spirit of consensus," Anwar said.

"I think there was a communication problem in the beginning, but the situation appears more positive now and Indonesia appears to be taking good measures," Anwar said.

Hundreds of forest and scrub fires, many of them deliberately lit to clear land for plantations, have been burning across Indonesia for weeks. Thick smog has drifted over neighboring Malaysia, southern Thailand and parts of the Philippines, as well as Singapore and Brunei.

Shifting winds and rains in the past two days have provided some relief in Indonesia and Malaysia, though pollution levels in Singapore soared Thursday.

Many environmentalists and some government officials in Malaysia have attacked Indonesia for not doing enough to prevent and put out the fires.

On Thursday, Industries Minister Lim Keng Yaik said he was disappointed Indonesia hadn't mobilized all its available resources to put out the peat fires that have burned some 600,000 hectares of land.

Lim said he had proposed to the Indonesians five years ago that they should have a better monitoring system to prevent forest fires.

Indonesia and Malaysia have deployed about 10,000 firefighters, but say it will take the upcoming monsoon rains to put the fires out, as has happened most years.

Separately, Malaysia's environment department said yesterday that the clear skies over the country now could again be shrouded with smog from forest fires if the current wind conditions change.

"What we know is that the worst for Indonesia in terms of the forest fires is far from over and that could be mean we are still at risk," department director-general Tan Meng Leng said.

"If the northeasterly winds blowing through Malaysia now become less effective and bring less rain, then the smog could return," he said.

In Malaysia's eastern Pahang state, peat fires that had been smoldering for the past several days in a forest were mostly extinguished by an overnight rainfall, officials said.

"It's down to embers," Azman Mohamed, deputy head of fire operations in Pahang's state capital of Kuantan, told Reuters by telephone. About 20 firefighters were standing by in case the flames flared up again.

A lack of rain and dwindling water supply from a nearby stream had originally hampered the firefighters' efforts. Residents of the area said it had not rained for weeks.

Malaysia's Air Pollutant Index in Kuala Lumpur was at a "good" level of 50 yesterday, said Tan, compared to the "unhealthy" and "hazardous" range of between 200 and 300 in the past month.