ENVIRONMENT MINISTERIAL FORUM EXPECTED TO SOLVE GLOBAL POLLUTION: OFFICIAL

Jakarta, Feb 16 (ANTARA) - Indonesia expects the 11th Global Environment Ministerial Forum to be held in Nusa Dua, Bali, next February 24-26 will give a solution to the environmental pollution issues, an official said.

"We hope the meeting will produce guidelines for development of domestic legislation on liability, response action and compensation for damage caused by environmental pollution," Minister of Environment, Gusti Muhammad Hatta, said here on Tuesday.

Citing an example, the minister said Indonesia had recently experienced sea pollution in the Timor Sea due to oil spills from an Australia-based company.

"We are still calculating the material loss due to the accident," he said.

Meanwhile, Director General of Multilateral Cooperation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Rezlan Ishar Janie, said the ministerial meeting in Bali would also discuss the possibility of funding developing countries to increase their capacity on maintaining biodiversity.

"The developing countries owned large numbers of biodiversity which needs to be managed well. Assistance is needed to help these countries manage their biodiversity as well as protecting the world from environmental damage," he said.

The global environmental ministerial forum is an event participated in by environment ministers from countries grouped in the United Nation Environment Forum (UNEP). It aims to review global policy on environment.

The upcoming event in Bali will be attended by 1500 participants consisting of 44 environment ministers, 35 deputy ministers and representatives from 70 NGOs from around the world.
There are three main topics to be discussed in the meeting namely environmental governance, green economy and biodiversity. (A051/H-NG/H-YH)