Indonesia Opens Airspace to Malaysian Cloud Seeding Flights to Fight Haze
Malaysia's environment minister says Indonesia has cleared its agencies to run cloud seeding operations over border areas as fires close schools and push air quality into unhealthy levels.
KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 24 (Reuters) - Indonesia has given Malaysian agencies official permission to enter its airspace to conduct cloud seeding operations, Malaysia's environment minister said on Monday, part of both countries' efforts to combat the haze blanketing the region.
Indonesia has been stepping up efforts to slow the spread of haze caused by forest and land fires across several provinces, which this month led to dozens of school closures, including in neighbouring Malaysia.
• Malaysia's national disaster management agency and its meteorological department were currently preparing schedules for cloud seeding operations in shared border locations, to be coordinated with the Indonesian military, Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability Minister Arthur Joseph Kurup said in a statement.
• Malaysia was also prepared to offer assistance to Indonesia in extinguishing fires, with any specific requests to be brought to cabinet for further action, Kurup said.
• Kurup said the two countries would be escalating their firefighting and fire prevention programmes ahead of national holidays in the coming weeks, including the Malaysia Day celebrations in Sarawak state on September 16.
• Sarawak, which borders Indonesia's Kalimantan province on Borneo island, has been worst hit by the haze.
• Six districts in Sarawak recorded unhealthy air pollution index (API) readings on Monday, according to data released by the environment department. Unhealthy API levels were also recorded in eight other districts across four states on the Malaysian peninsula, the data showed.
(Reporting by Rozanna Latiff and Ashley Tang; Editing by David Stanway)
