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Indonesia Forest Fires Trigger Severe Haze in Malaysia

evening · · thread: Severe Weather Alerts Issued for Argentina and Central United States

3 sources across 3 countries · Indonesia · Malaysia · United Kingdom

Who reported this

  • The Jakarta Post Indonesia · Centre-left · PT Bina Media Tenggara
  • Malaysiakini Malaysia · Centre-left · Mkini Dotcom, subscriber-funded
  • The Economist United Kingdom · Centre-right · Exor N.V. and Agnelli family

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  • Centre-left
  • Centre
  • Centre-right
  • Right
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Indonesia has experienced a significant increase in land and forest fires, with approximately 182,000 hectares burned in July alone. This monthly total is nearly double the area burned during the first half of the year. According to the Nusantara Atlas platform, the total area burned this year has reached 285,000 hectares, with the majority of hotspots located in West Kalimantan, South Papua, East Kalimantan, and Central Kalimantan. The resulting haze has crossed the border into Malaysia, specifically affecting Sarawak since August 8. In Sarawak, the capital city of Kuching was ranked as the most polluted major city in the world by IQAir on Tuesday. The situation has led to the closure of more than 100 schools in Malaysia. The Malaysian Meteorological Department attributed the pollution to a cross border haze phenomenon from Kalimantan and warned that the haze is expected to continue for three to five more days, noting that low rainfall is exacerbating the conditions. The situation is reported to be worse in the west and south of Sarawak.

How each side framed it

Centre-left
These sources focused on the specific data regarding burned acreage and the immediate public health impacts in Malaysia.
Centre-right
This source framed the event as a regional crisis and questioned whether South East Asia has learned from previous similar events.

Sources

83% of the statements in this article were traced back to the source articles listed above.