TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search resultsPolice crack down on land burning in Kalimantan
Police have named 72 suspects in their crackdown on deliberate land burning after President Prabowo Subianto over the weekend ordered a rapid response to land fires in Kalimantan and Sumatra.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
Set as preferred source
A helicopter drops water on burning forests on Aug. 13 in the Petuk Katimpun area, Palangka Raya, Central Kalimantan. (AFP/Reina)
P
olice have named 72 suspects in their crackdown on deliberate land burning after President Prabowo Subianto ordered over the weekend a rapid response to disasters ravaging parts of the country, including efforts to contain the land fires in Kalimantan and Sumatra.
The National Police’s Criminal Investigation Department (Bareskrim) on Sunday said police investigations across five provinces in Kalimantan and four in Sumatra found evidence suggesting that fires detected through satellite-monitored hot spots had been deliberately set by the suspects.
The largest number of suspects was recorded in Riau, where police named 35 people after investigating fires among more than 1,200 detected hot spots. South Sumatra and Central Kalimantan followed with 17 and 11 suspects, respectively. The police did not reveal their identities.
“The motive was clearly land clearing. During the dry season, it is very easy to burn land before planting oil palm when the rainy season comes,” Bareskrim special crimes director Brig. Gen. Mohammad Irhamni told a press briefing on Sunday.
Irhamni said the evidence seized, including matches and oil palm seedlings, further indicated that the suspects intentionally burned land to reduce the cost of clearing it for oil palm cultivation, a long-standing practice that has contributed to recurring fires and haze during Indonesia’s dry season.
The crackdown on land burning practices came amid worsening fires across Kalimantan, which has affected an estimated 38,310 hectares in West Kalimantan, 7,634 ha in Central Kalimantan and 8,620 ha in South Kalimantan, according to the National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB).
“We are concentrating our firefighting in the three provinces,” BNPB acting spokesperson Berton Panjaitan said on Sunday, adding that satellite monitoring continues to detect thousands of hot spots, including more than 2,700 in West Kalimantan and nearly 2,500 in Central Kalimantan.
