Mission News
Malaysia to Forward Proposal on Haze Fund at ASEAN Meeting
22 October 2006
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Bernama
Malaysia will forward a proposal on the setting up of a haze fund and the use of sound mechanisms to tackle the perennial problem in the region at the ASEAN Ministerial Meeting on Haze in the Phillipines next month.
Natural Resources and Environment Minister Azmi Khalid said he was asked by the Cabinet to propose both measures at the meeting.
The meeting will ascertain how the fund will be managed and the amount needed to tackle the hace problem, he told reporters after handing out "Hari Raya" (Eid) aid to the needy at a function organised by the Cheras Umno division here on Friday.
"The cost to bring the haze under control is exhorbitant because the applicable method at present involves the use of aircraft for fighting forest fires. Therefore it is only fair that other ASEAN countries share the cost of dousing forest fires in Indonesia, which had failed to tackle the problem over the last few years," he said.
Azmi said ASEAN would be meeting every three months to find long term and short term measures to tackle the haze.
The setting up of the fund was mooted by the Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak recently.
In 2002, ASEAN countries agreed to join forces to fight forest and peat soil fires in member states but Indonesia has yet to ratify the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution to tackle the problem.
On the haze in Malaysia, Azmi said there was nothing much that could be done except for hoping for wind and rain to clear the air.
Appeared in KPL News - 23 Oct 2006