Jakarta Globe 1 Apr 14;
Jakarta. The number of hotspots detected in the troubled Indonesian province of Riau fell to zero over the weekend after forest fires burned intermittently for some two months, Indonesian officials said on Tuesday, as they announced plans to recall some 1,000 military personnel sent to combat the region’s annual haze-causing fires.
“The hotspots in Riau have continued to disappear,” National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said in a press statement released on Tuesday. “On Sunday there were ZERO hotspots and from Monday to today there is only one more hotspot.”
The announcement was the first sign of hope since the forest fires re-emerged after a brief reprieve, surging to 777 hotspots by Friday and prompting stern action from local law enforcement. More than 100 people and one company, National Sago Prima — a subsidiary of Sampoerna Agro, have been implicated in this year’s forest fires to date. The fires, and the ensuing haze, have cost the province some Rp 10 trillion ($890 million) in losses by the start of March, according to the state-run Antara News Agency.
While the haze from this year’s forest fires failed to reach neighboring Singapore and Malaysia in a significant way, air quality in Sumatra fell to hazardous levels, prompting the local government to declare a state of emergency as flights were diverted, more than 100,000 fell ill and three died, according to reports in local media.
The men, a villager named Muhammad Adli, 63, and a Surya Damai Agrindo plantation worker named Muslim, 30, were reported dead by the Indonesian news portal Okezone.com. According to the report, Aldi suffered fatal injuries after falling into burning peatland while Muslim died as he attempted to combat the forest fires as flames closed-in on the company’s plantations.
A third still unidentified man died of asthma-related symptoms, Sutopo told the Jakarta Globe. The elderly man was reportedly ill long before the fires began to burn, he said.
“The victim died due to old age and because he had been ill from the beginning,” Sutopo told the Jakarta Globe.
By Tuesday the conditions in Riau showed signs of returning to normal. The air quality was getting better and operations at Pekanbaru’s Sultan Syarif Kasim II International Airport have resumed normal operations.
“The air quality ranges from healthy to moderate on Tuesday,” Sutopo said. “There are no more [regions in Riau reporting] ‘unhealthy’ or ‘dangerous’ levels [of air pollutants].”
The government will now start to wind down its Integrated Operation Task Force — a 2,000-strong haze-reduction force that included members of the BNPB and the Indonesian Military (TNI). All members of the task force sent to Riau will be screened by health care officials before they return to regular rotation in Jakarta.
“The operations have been carried out well,” Sutopo said. “All the personnel involved in the operation went all-out… All the personnel will have their health conditions checked. They’ve been exposed to fires and haze for three weeks.”
