Singapore widens haze probe

Published Updated
0
  A volunteer provides mobile oxygen relief to a firefighter while battling forest  fires in Indonesia’s Kalimantan province. Toxic haze has covered parts of Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore for the last four weeks.—AFP
A volunteer provides mobile oxygen relief to a firefighter while battling forest fires in Indonesia’s Kalimantan province. Toxic haze has covered parts of Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore for the last four weeks.—AFP

SINGAPORE: Singapore expanded on Friday its probe into companies linked to fires in Indonesia, asking 10 locally-based firms for information about their efforts to contain blazes blamed for toxic haze covering the region.

The city state has beefed up measures to combat the months-long blazes and had vowed legal action against companies responsible for the fires that have made regional air quality among the world’s worst.

Over the past week, Singapore issued notices to 10 foreign-based companies, insisting that they deploy fire-fighting teams, stop burning or starting new fires in Indonesia and submit information about their links with associated companies in Indonesia and Singapore.

The information is to be reviewed by Singapore’s National Environmental Agency (NEA).

In addition to these companies, the NEA is seeking information from 10 Singapore-registered firms in the palm oil or forestry industry who are involved with Indonesian land, the environmental agency said in a statement on Friday.

The information relates to “linkages with associated companies in Singapore and Indonesia, the location of land concessions owned by them as well as fire preventative measures or firefighting efforts”, the statement said.

Singapore also said it would form a panel of experts comprising law firms, audit firms and investigative firms with expertise in conducting cross-border inquiries and investigations to help with its probe.

Published in Dawn, October 24th, 2026

Opinion

Editorial

Breaking the cycle
24 Oct, 2026

Breaking the cycle

THE World Bank’s latest Pakistan Development Update sets out what faster reforms could deliver for the economy. If...
Gaza starvation
24 Oct, 2026

Gaza starvation

ON account of funding cuts and Israeli cruelty, the threat of famine once again looms over the occupied Gaza Strip....
Harvesting rackets
24 Oct, 2026

Harvesting rackets

ORGAN vending rarely leaves the spotlight. The FIA and the Human Organ Transplantation Authority recently took five...
Nuclear uncertainty
Updated 23 Oct, 2026

Nuclear uncertainty

With matters frozen in the political and diplomatic spheres, it will take military-to-military engagement to prevent miscalculation in the strategic sphere.
Auto illusion
Updated 23 Oct, 2026

Auto illusion

PAKISTAN’S draft auto policy 2026-31 is ambitious in its targets and directionless in its strategy. It promises...
Two crimes
23 Oct, 2026

Two crimes

THE senseless killing of a teenager by his employers in Multan is a crime that deserves unqualified condemnation. It...