14 companies named as suspects in forest fires

Five companies have been named suspects in land and forest fires by the police in Lampung, thereby adding to the list of corporate suspects in the case to 14 firms situated in some Indonesian regions.

"In the latest development, the Lampung Police have named five suspects in five cases. None of them are individual suspects," spokesman of the Indonesian Police Brig. Gen Dedi Prasetyo remarked here on Tuesday.

PT SIL , PT ILP, PTP, PT PML , and another concession of PT SIL  were the five corporations that the Lampung Police had named as suspects.

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Earlier, some companies named suspects in land and forest fires comprised PT SSS in Riau, PT HL  in South Sumatra, PT MAS in Jambi, PT MIB  and PT BIT  in South Kalimantan, PT PGK  in Central Kalimantan, PT SAP  and PT SISU in West Kalimantan.

Prasetyo affirmed that forest fires in nine regions -- Riau, Aceh, South Sumatra, Jambi, South Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan, West Kalimantan, East Kalimantan, and Lampung -- had covered an area of 7,482 hectares, with the largest area detected in South Sumatra, spanning 1,783 hectares.

"Our focus this week is on the investigation into the involvement of corporations allegedly negligent in controlling forest fire in their concession land. The companies failed to take preliminary measures to anticipate land and forest fires," he stated.

In addition to corporate suspects, the police have also named 323 individual suspects, comprising 79 in Central Kalimantan, 59 in Riau, one in Aceh, 26 in South Sumatra, 39 in Jambi, 26 in South Kalimantan, 69 in West Kalimantan, and 24 in East Kalimantan.

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