JAKARTA, Dec 4 (Reuters) – Indonesia will revoke mining permits if companies are found to have violated rules on flood-ravaged Sumatra island, the energy minister said as questions intensified about the role of deforestation in worsening the deadly disaster.
Cyclone-induced floods and landslides have left about 800 dead and 564 missing across the three provinces of West Sumatra, North Sumatra and Aceh, according to government data.
The cyclone systems have also killed almost 200 people in Malaysia and Thailand, and followed months of deadly weather in Southeast Asia, including deadly typhoons in the Philippines and Vietnam.
In Indonesia, landslides have cut power and blocked roads, hampering rescuers and aid getting to isolated villages.
On Thursday, Environment Minister Hanif Faisol Nurofiq said on Instagram that the disaster was caused by a changing climate intensifying bad weather events and environmental damage, pointing to shrinking forest cover across the three worst-affected provinces.
Green groups said deforestation linked to mining and illegal logging exacerbated the disasters, where landslides left ruins and pools of mud where homes used to be. Images of logs washing ashore on Sumatra after the floods have sparked outrage among social media users.
Energy Minister Bahlil Lahadalia told evacuated residents in West Sumatra on Wednesday that he would look at revoking mining permits of companies if they were found to have violated rules.
“If in our evaluations they have proven to have violated or are not adherent, then we will do our job without any hesitation according to the rules in place,” he said on Wednesday’s visit.
Environment-focused group JATAM said legal permits to convert forests into extraction zones covered about 54,000 hectares (133,000 acres), the majority of them for mining.
Among the permit holders is PT Agincourt Resources, which operates the Martabe gold mine in the Batang Toru ecosystem.
In a statement to Reuters this week it said making a direct link between the floods and the mine’s operations was “a premature and inaccurate conclusion”.
Between 2001 and 2024, Sumatra as a whole lost 4.4 million hectares (11 million acres) of forest, an area bigger than Switzerland, said David Gaveau, founder of deforestation monitor Nusantara Atlas.
(Reporting by Stanley Widianto)
