Asean haze agreement must show its teeth

IT may have taken much longer than some would have liked, but Indonesia's Parliament finally voted on Tuesday to ratify the Asean Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution, 12 long years after Indonesia first signed the pact together with the other nine Asean member states, including Singapore.

The breakthrough could not have come at a better time, especially with the recent escalation of hot spots in Sumatra and Kalimantan. The haze also made its unwelcome return to Singapore this week as the National Environment Agency's Pollutant Standards Index reading briefly crossed into the unhealthy range on Monday morning due to increased hot-spot activity in Sumatra.

Indonesia has been the target of much criticism of late for its failure to ratify the Asean agreement, particularly last year when vast forest fires in Indonesia caused the worst pollution crisis in the region in a decade. Indonesia, the largest economy in South-east Asia, was the last Asean country to ratify the treaty because of fears among some of its parliamentarians that certain clauses in the agreement would infringe on the country's sovereignty.