At the time I was writing this, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono had already apologized to Malaysians and Singaporeans. The apology seems to me a mere effort to save the country's image internationally, especially regarding its forest protection efforts that are not considered that good in the eyes of the international community.

I truly applaud Mr. Yudhoyono's commitment to protecting our forests and reducing global CO2 emissions by extending the forest moratorium as laid out in a decree issued not so long ago. But, unfortunately, this incident has shown us that we actually need more than a decree to protect our own forests; we need more than words on a white paper.

We need action, preventive action to stop such events from happening again. Maybe we can charge those people or firms who set fires on our land and in our forests and we can prosecute them, but then if we are looking for justice, however severely we punish them, we won't get our forests back.

I think our government is to blame, not for the smog in Singapore and Malaysia but for its negligence in not preventing this incident. Even so, this is not the time to lay blame. This is the time for all of us in these three countries to work together to quickly extinguish the fires. After that, the three countries have to sit down together at one table to determine preventive measures to avoid any repetition of such an occurrence in the future.

And don't forget about the local people who are directly affected by this incident. I think they are the ones that the government should have apologized to, not the Singaporeans and Malaysians. Businesses will slow down there and that must be the last thing they want, especially in an economy like this. The government has to make them the priority and offer them all necessary aid.

A J Lienardi
Bandung

Indonesians, stop destroying your own country! It is a crying shame that such a beautiful place is being wrecked so quickly and in such a thoughtless way.

Grabski Kuba

SBY, it's not your fault and I feel sorry that the lack of a proper legal framework in Indonesia and scrupulous businessmen has brought you before the nation and world to say sorry.

The people who set the fires are greedy, selfish and stupid. Bring them to justice to avoid such things from happening again.

Higgs

Topic of the day

Haj pilgrimage postponement

Some 40,000 Indonesians will have to postpone their religious pilgrimages to Mecca this year after Saudi Arabia recently announced that renovations to haj facilities had yet to be completed. Consequently, Indonesia will suffer some Rp 800 billion (US$80 million) in losses. What do you think?

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