There was one time when I could see the Petronas Twin Towers clearly from my home in Kuala Lumpur. At the moment however, the view is kind of hazy, no thanks to Indonesia.
In ASEAN, there is a treaty known as Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution (pdf). Basically, it encourages parties of the treaty to cooperate with each other in combating haze. As of August 2005, seven ASEAN members have ratified the agreement. They are Brunei, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. It is, however too bad that none of the parties is a major contributor to the haze – the one prime source of this haze, Indonesia, has yet to ratify the treaty.
ASEAN members need to pressure Indonesia into signing this treaty. Forget about Myanmar’s progress towards democracy for awhile. I don’t think Malaysians and indeed Singaporeans should care for Myanmar if we all are going to choke ourselves to death with Indonesian smog. We should criticize Indonesia first and Myanmar second unless Myanmar somehow gets some sort of nuclear warhead from North Korea.
ASEAN politicians have praised Indonesia for reducing open burning in Sumatra. But surely, praise or no praise, Indonesia is not doing enough. ASEAN’s worst haze happened in 1998 and since then, several ASEAN members have themselves covered by smog yearly. More needs to be done and Indonesia’s ratification of the transboundary haze pollution treaty is a great jumpstart towards improving the air quality in Southeast Asia.
If Indonesia lacks the resources needed to implement enforcement against open burning, I’m sure Malaysia and Singapore and even Brunei could offer assistance in term of manpower and monetary aid.
If nothing could convince Indonesia to tie up its shoelaces, then Malaysia and Singapore should team up and invade Indonesia, divide Sumatra among themselves and solve this haze problem once and for all.
Or, we, about 25 million Malaysians plus a couple millions of Singaporeans could together take a deep breath and blow the haze towards Jakarta. Let’s see if they like their own shit.
Or the Malaysian government could build fat ass fans that could redirect the haze towards Jakarta. Or at least until all the haze reaches Singapore… err, I mean Indonesia.
God, this haze thing is driving me nut.
p/s – Oh, if you are reading this David, don’t let Monika read this. Else, the grand scheme to grab Sumatra would fail!
pp/s – I’m moving to a new host soon. So, please bookmark www.maddruid.com instead of my current url.
6 replies on “[561] Of haze and the need to invade Indonesia”
[…] have strong feeling that the answer is unfortunately no. Even if Indonesia rectified the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution, chances are, it would change […]
If the invasion really does happen… oh what the heck, let’s give Acheh independence to lessen the burden… :P
Heh, I was joking about invading Indonesia. =p
Everything said after “Malaysia and Singapore should team up” is preposterous.
Nice thoughts but I don’t think either Singapore or Malaysia would like Sumatra. It has over 40 million people. Which means etnic Malays would become the majority in Singapore, while Sumatran Malays would overshadow Bugis, etc. Malays in Malaysia.
Well, Lee Kuan Yew managed to piss the Indonesian off a few years ago. Hell, Malaysia stole Sipadan and Ligitan during daylight from Indo.
All we need to do is tickle Indo a bit. I’m sure they will give up Sumatra.
But of course, Singapore needs to tickle Indo first. Malaysia will follow if nothing scary happened.
well… perhaps it is the fact that myammar dun have nuclear bomb, that ASEAN countries keep pressuring it? whereas for indonesia, with its angry bomb-making muslims, dun think any neighboring countries (lead by their soft spine leaders) dare touch them… make sense?