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Indonesia accepts help from Singapore to deal with haze formally

Xinhua, October 8, 2015 Adjust font size:

Singapore government has received a formal note from Indonesia, stating that it welcomes the cooperation offered by Singapore to suppress large-scale forest fires which caused transboundary haze pollution, reported Channel NewsAsia on Thursday.

The formal note came a day after Singapore's Foreign Affairs Minister Vivian Balakrishnan said he had a good discussion with his Indonesian counterpart in his Facebook post on Wednesday.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo has asked help from Malaysia, Russia, Japan and Singapore to battle the fires on the islands of Sumatra and Kalimantan on Thursday. According to Channel NewsAsia' s report, Singapore's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it is awaiting further details from Indonesian counterparts.

Singapore's Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen updated his Facebook on Thursday night, saying that Singapore is ready to help Indonesia combat the forest fires blamed for the haze that has blanketed the region for weeks.

Minister Ng said he was "glad Indonesian leaders have stated publicly that they accept Singapore's help to fight the haze".

Singapore has reiterated that the assistance package includes one C-130 aircraft for cloud seeding operations, up to two C-130 aircraft to ferry a fire-fighting assistance team from Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF), high resolution satellite pictures and hotspot coordinates, as well as a Chinook helicopter with one heli- bucket under-slung.

In addition, Minister Ng wrote in the post that Singapore can follow-up with a Super Puma helicopter with a 2,000L heli-bucket as needed.

The transboundary haze has pushed up pollution to dangerous levels across parts of Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and southern Thailand, disrupted flights and closed schools on bad days. Endi