Lewa Pardomuan, Jakarta – Thick smog from rampant forest and bush fires spread to more cities in Indonesia on Sunday while uncertainties over the start of the annual monsoon rains linge

Louise Williams, Jakarta – Hot, dry winds across Indonesia have caused a dramatic fourfold increase in forest fires and new smog warnings, after last week's light rains and initial succ

Jakarta – Indonesia was urged on Thursday to carefully preserve and manage its peat forests to avoid environmental disasters such as that which has covered much of Southeast Asia in cho

John McBeth, Jakarta &150; Almost nightly on Indonesian television, thousands of firefighters armed with little more than water-filled backpacks are shown trying to beat back the bl

Michael Shari &150; For years, environmentalists have pleaded with governments in Southeast Asia to save the region's vast rain forests.

Amidst the fires furore, spare a thought for Forestry Minister Jamaludin Suryohadikusumo.

Margot Cohen in Jakarta and Murray Hiebert in Kuala Lumpur – President Suharto's unprecedented apology for the forest fires that are spewing smoke over neighbouring Malaysia and Singapo

Catherine Shepherd – Blue skies? Sunshine? Millions of people in Malaysia and Indonesia have a hard time remembering what that looks like.

George J. Aditjondro &150; The haze enveloping our northern neighbours should not be allowed to obscure a lesson for their ruling elites, who are largely to blame for the disaster.

Friends of the Earth International today called for immediate and effective action by the Indonesian government to combat the continuing forest fire crisis.(1)

David Miller, Sumatra – Malaysian firefighters eager to get on with the job of fighting the forest and peat fires here have been forced to play a waiting game.

Derwin Pereira, Indonesia – has rejected blame for the haze blanketing large areas of South-east Asia, saying that one of the culprits is the El Nino climatic phenomenon that no one cou

Azhar Basri, Jakarta – An Indonesian ministerial report has blamed 176 logging and plantation firms over the huge forest fires which had already choked most areas in southeast Asia, say

Ian MacKenzie, Jakarta – Burning forest peat, too hot and thick to be put out by fire-fighting equipment alone, is now the major cause of choking smog spreading across Southeast Asia, d

Lewa Pardomuan, Jakarta – Forest fires in Indonesia have spread to rubber and palm oil plantations and are likely to hit output, officials and traders said on Friday.

Jakarta – The Environment Minister has released a list of 176 timber companies which are considered to be "at fault" in [causing] the fires in Sumatra and Kalamantan.

Kuala Lumpur – Malaysian non-governmental organisations staged a rare demonstration on Sunday demanding immediate and serious action from authorities to combat a smoky haze blanketing p

Louise Williams, Jakarta – President Soeharto has publicly apologised to Indonesia's neighbours over thousands of forest fires which have sent a thick haze of smoke as far north as Kual

Jakarta – Indonesia abruptly shifted an ASEAN environmental meeting opening on Tuesday to Jakarta from remote Sulawesi due to smoke haze causing a pollution emergency over parts of Sout

Jim Della-Giacoma, Gelumbang – Dusk comes an hour early each day in this part of Indonesia's Sumatra island as a pall of smoke rising from a patchwork of grass and scrub fires blankets

Jakarta – Indonesian Environment Minister Sarwono Kusumaatmadja has identified three local firms that cleared land for agriculture through illegal burning, the Jakarta Post newspaper re

Unlike the pervasive haze in 1994 which trapped Singapore in a suffocating day-long twilight, the island has so far been spared the worst of this year's seasonal nuisance.

The Indonesian government has threatened to expose the names of logging and plantation companies that are lighting fires to clear land on the islands of Kalimantan and Sumatra.

Derwin Pereira, Jakarta – The Indonesian government, threatening legal action, has blamed plantation firms for the country's forest fires which have caused haze to envelope the region.

Catherine Shepherd and Keith Loveard, Jakarta – In Indonesia these days, many people are holding their breath in more ways than one.

Louise Williams, Jakarta – From the air, the great rainforests of Borneo have disappeared under billowing clouds of smoke from hundreds of forest fires raging out of control, forcing pl

[The following is a slightly abridged letter from George J.

Susan Sim, Jakarta – The good news is that the Indonesian forest fires this year are not as extensive as those three years ago.

Indonesian Ministers are due to take a decision approving plans for a 70,000 hectare oil palm plantation and transmigration project in the buffer zone of Siberut NationalPark in early 1