Asia & Pacific
A firefighter battles a peatland wildfire on July 10, 2025, as forest and land fires returned amid extreme heat, in Rimba Panjang, Riau.
(AFP/Wahyudi)
Hoping to avert a recurrence of transboundary haze ahead of the peak of the El Niño climate phenomenon, Singapore is rallying behind multilateral initiatives with its fire-prone neighbors, including Indonesia, which has already seen a surge in forest fires across several provinces this year.Cross-border haze has historically blanketed large parts of Southeast Asia during El Niño years, with unchecked land and forest clearing mostly in Indonesia’s Sumatra and Kalimantan becoming a major source of discontent within the bloc.
The region may see the return of widespread smog driven by El Niño and another warming climatic event called the positive Indian Ocean Dipole between August and September this year, according to a recent report published by Singapore-based think tank the Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA).
