The park, which has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, has welcomed a growing number of tourists both from Indonesia and overseas. However, the influx had caused several environmental problems impacting the natural landscape of the park, the Environment and Forestry Ministry’s director general for natural resources and ecosystems, Wiratno, said, adding that the fire was one of them.

Piles of garbage left behind by tourists also caused damage to the national park, he added.

Ministry data show that 10,250 people, 95 percent of them being foreigners, visit the Komodo National Park monthly. That number stands in stark contrast to the 130 people assigned to manage and monitor the park.

“More than 10,000 visitors every month is very much. We will limit it to 5,000 per month, probably,” Wiratno said, adding that he would issue a directorate general decree regulating the matter by the end of this year, after conducting some studies.

Once the new regulation is in effect next year, people planning to visit the park will need to register online, with signups limited by a daily quota.

A fire, allegedly caused by a cigarette tossed by a visitor, burned 10 hectares of the savanna vegetation of Gili Lawa Darat on Aug. 1. The West Manggarai Police has questioned 11 people over the blaze.

LAOS HAS to wake up from its dream to be the major power supplier of the region, say critics.

The recent tragedy at the Xe-Pien Xe-Namnoy hydropower dam has clearly demonstrated that the benefits from selling electricity are small compared to the loss of human life and suffering of Lao citizens, along with the irreversible damage to the environment, said experts and environmentalists.

They were speaking at a public panel discussion yesterday at the Christian Student Centre in Bangkok.

The experts, who discussed foreign investments in hydropower dam projects in Laos, on the whole agreed that Laos’ ambition to be the “Battery of Asia” had done more harm than good for the country. The real beneficiaries of this policy are the foreign investors and hydropower companies, while Lao residents, who suffer the most adverse impacts from the dams, barely get any benefit, they said.

Instead of continuing the unfair trade with the foreign energy industrialists, a participant suggested the Lao government set aside their costly hydropower ambitions, and seek sustainable economic strategies based on the country’s strengths and identities.

Niwat Roykaew, a prominent environmentalist and local sage from Chiang Rai’s Chaing Khong district, said the claims of hydropower dam developers that the local people and the country would get many benefits from building dams, have been contradicted by evidence from the sites of the facilities operating in Laos.

“The dam developers always say that their project will provide free renewable energy from water, while the dam’s reservoirs would support local agriculture and aquaculture and be the water management tool for prevention of flood and drought,” Niwat said.

“These are all myths, as even after many were built on the upstream of Mekong River, there were still floods in the downstream areas. Moreover, they have never admitted that generation of electricity from hydropower dams actually has many hidden environmental and social costs.”

He said construction of dams greatly change the river’s environment, causing gradual environmental degradation, accumulated damage to the river ecosystem, eventually leading to an ecological catastrophe in the river.

Way of life affected

The death of the river’s ecosystem will also heavily affect the way of life and traditional culture of the local communities along the riverbank that rely on the resources from a healthy ecosystem, he said.

“The only reason dam developers insist on maintaining this hydropower development strategy is because they are the ones who get the most benefit from the policy. The over-investment in hydropower in Laos has served only the objective of making the already rich investors become richer,” Niwat said.

Premrudee Daoruang, coordinator of Laos Dam Investment Monitor, said the disaster at Xe-Pien Xe-Namnoy hydropower dam has provided the clearest example yet on the danger of hydropower dams in Laos. This tragedy was not caused by a natural disaster, but by human errors, she said.

“The dam is poorly built in an effort to minimise the construction costs as much as possible. The dam developers also did not warn the people downstream, even though they had noticed the signs of damage to the dam structure,” Premrudee said.

“Moreover, the flash floods triggered by the dam’s collapse has also affected a large area across the border in Cambodia, emphasising the truth that Mekong River system is an international river, so there should be a transboundary impact assessment study for every large construction project in the river.”

The organisation, Save the Mekong, issued a statement at the panel to the investors and loan providers of the Xe-Pien Xe-Namnoy hydropower dam project. The coalition of non-governmental organisations, community-based groups, and concerned citizens within Mekong region demanded that the companies take responsibility for the disaster, as it was their investment project, and fully remedy the impact on every victim of the dam’s failure.

Supalak Ganjanakhundee, editor at The Nation, pointed to the problems that Laos faced from hydropower investment projects, the current electricity generation situation in the region, and the issue of accuracy in power-demand predictions. Those issues make it unrealistic and financially unreasonable for Laos to pursue its goal to invest in hydropower projects to meet the power demand of neighbours, said Supalak.

However, Supalak said, the Laos government had shown an understanding of the problems with its Battery of Asia plan when it announced recently a review of the hydropower strategy.

He suggested that the Lao government consider an alternate plan to drive the country’s economy and fight poverty. Laos is a small country, he said, but rich with a diverse and distinctive cultural heritage of many ethnic minorities. The natural attractions and picturesque scenery of Laos are also famous. Considering these advantages, Laos could be easily developed into a globally renowned eco-tourism destination, Supalak offered.

Indonesian sculptor Nyoman Nuarta, who designed the statue, said he went to GWK Cultural Park a few hours after the earthquake, worrying about the cranes that could have toppled onto the statue and the welfare of the workers.

Fortunately, the cranes had been moved below prior to the quake.

Read also: Garuda Wisnu Kencana: Precious gift for Independence Day

He added that the statue was still intact. Nyoman told tempo.co that the statue was actually earthquake-proof, adding that he had considered the risk of earthquakes in the area.

The GWK is a phenomenal landmark in Bali. The development of the statue started in 1989 and when it is completed it will be 121 meters tall, 30 m taller than the Statue of Liberty in the United States.

    The photos of Nisha Ayub and Pang Khee Teik were taken down from display at an arts festival in the northern state of Penang this week following the government order, festival organisers confirmed.

Authorities in Muslim-majority Malaysia often take a dim view of homosexuality, and the country retains its colonial-era ban on sodomy.

Officials have been criticised for introducing programmes directed at the LGBT community, such as a competition launched last year by the health ministry offering cash prizes to whoever could create the best video explaining how to “prevent” homosexuality.

In the latest controversy, Mujahid Yusof Rawa, a minister overseeing Islamic affairs, said he had ordered the portraits’ removal as they promoted LGBT activities, the Star newspaper reported.

“I have consistently repeated in parliament that we do not support the promotion of LGBT culture in Malaysia,” he was cited as saying.

The portraits at the annual George Town Festival showed Nisha, a transgender woman, holding the Malaysian flag, and Pang, a gay man, with the Malaysian flag draped over his shoulders, holding the rainbow gay pride flag.

Nisha told AFP she feared the portraits’ removal could lead to people who are lesbian, gay, bi-sexual or transgender being targeted more.

“A lot of the community out there, especially trans women, they’re exposed to a lot of violence,” she told AFP.

Thilaga Sulathireh, co-founder of transgender activist group Justice for Sisters, said that LGBT people should be protected under Malaysia’s constitution.

“We should be able to live with dignity and personal freedoms,” she told AFP.

Mujahid has attracted much controversy recently.

Earlier this week, he sparked anger by announcing the government was working on a plan to introduce a dress code for Muslim women in the private sector. It will comply with Islamic principles, although no details were disclosed.

Female civil servants in the multi-ethnic country are already subject to guidelines which typically require them to dress modestly.

Rights group the Women’s Aid Organisation slammed the plan as “extremely sexist”.

She dismissed it as an urban myth. But it wasn’t long before she saw it with her own eyes. At a health centre in Lagos, a mother brought in a two-month-old infant who was crying in pain.

“He had very large boils all over his body,” the soft-spoken 27-year-old Nigerian told AFP. “It seemed like they weren’t normal.”

The baby’s mother explained that she had mixed a steroid cream with shea butter and slathered his skin with it in order to make it whiter.

“I was very appalled. It was distressing,” said Sobande. Shocked, the young doctor now takes a different view on skin bleaching, also called lightening or whitening.

For many Nigerians, it is a “standard procedure,” a gateway to beauty and success, she said.

“It’s a mindset that has eaten into society. For a lot of people, it’s the path to getting a good job, having a relationship.”

– Africa risk –

Skin lightening is popular in many parts of the world, including South Asia and the Middle East.

But medical experts say that in Africa — a continent where regulations are often lax or scorned — the widening phenomenon is laden with health risks.

Cultural watchdogs, for their part, see it as the toxic legacy of colonialism.

Africa is experiencing a “massive trend of increased use (of skin bleaching), particularly in teenagers and young adults,” said Lester Davids, a physiology professor at the University of Pretoria in South Africa.

“The older generation used creams — the new generation uses pills and injectables. The horror is that we do not know what these things do in high concentrations over time in the body.”

Where statistics about Africa’s skin-bleaching industry exist, they are often old or unreliable.

But evidence from the range of products, suppliers and services points to a continent-wide market that may number tens of millions of people and possibly more.

In Nigeria alone, 77 per cent of women — by extrapolation, more than 60 million people — are using lightening products on a “regular basis”, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in 2011.

– Bootleg creams –

Experts say the African market is rapidly expanding as companies seek to cash in on the continent’s booming youth population.

“More clients want insight on the lightening market,” said Rubab Abdoolla, a beauty analyst at market researchers Euromonitor International.

The rich tend to opt for pricier registered products which are available in standard doses.

Others are likely to buy creams, often bootleg concoctions mixed in the back streets, that may be dangerous and are blatantly sold in defiance of official bans or constraints.

Ingredients may include hydroquinone, steroids, mercury and lead — the same element that, at high doses, poisoned Elizabethan courtiers who powdered their faces ivory white.

“These chemicals damage respiratory, kidney and reproductive systems,” an official from the Nigerian drug control agency warned. “They cause cancer, affect the nervous system, deform unborn babies.”

In spite of the risks, authorities are struggling to control the bleaching innovations, which include a compound called glutathione, taken as injections or pills.

Nigeria, South Africa and Kenya have all banned skin bleaching products with high amounts of hydroquinone and mercury, with the province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa urging people to “reject all colonial notions of beauty”.

In July, Ghana’s Food and Drugs Authority issued a statement telling pregnant women not to take glutathione pills to bleach their unborn babies saying that there may be “serious toxic side effects” such as “asthma, renal failure and chest pains.”

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) stresses that it has not given approval for any of the injections on the market today.

“These products are potentially unsafe and ineffective, and might contain unknown harmful ingredients or contaminants.”

– ‘Addiction’ –

Those who start using skin lightening say they invariably stay with the practice.

“Before you know it, it has become some sort of an addiction where you want to maintain that look,” said Dabota Lawson, a Lagos socialite and cosmetics entrepreneur.

“Just like with plastic surgery, it begins to feel like it’s never enough.”

In Lagos, the creams are assembled by a legion of cosmetologists and sold at a price anywhere from 5,000 naira to 20,000 naira ($14-55, 12-47 euros), a prohibitive amount in a country where the minimum wage is just 18,000 naira ($50, 42 euros).

Instagram skincare star Pela Okiemute’s “Russian White” body cream claims to give “firmness, intense beauty and a mixed race complexion”.

His “Cleopatra Royal” cream, whose label features Elizabeth Taylor in her famous role as the Egyptian queen, promises to “lighten and radiate”.

Customers should start seeing results in two weeks, says Okiemute, explaining that his creams, which include collagen, kojic acid and “anti-ageing” snail slime are safe, though he declined to divulge his formula.

“We have a lot of customers who have used a lot of wrong products, they come to us and we give solutions,” he says.

He flicked through his phone to show before-and-after photos of a client who had a problem with dark knuckles, a telltale sign of a skin bleacher.

Intravenous injections and pills of glutathione — an antioxidant naturally found in the body that has a lightening side effect — are the new frontiers of skin bleaching.

At his clinic on the outskirts of Lagos, beside an abandoned Chinese restaurant, plastic surgeon Aranmolate Ayobami charges clients 150,000 naira ($415, 350 euros) for a five-week course of glutathione injections.

Known as the “Buttmaster” for helping patients seeking an hourglass figure, Ayobami buys the injections from companies he trusts in the United Arab Emirates or the United States.

He only gives certain dosages for a limited amount of time, he said.

But sometimes clients will bring in their own cheaper product that they bought online and urge him to inject them. “We try to discourage that,” he said.

– #Melaninpoppin –

If many millions of Africans lighten their skin without regret, others are dismayed.

“Skin bleaching is one manifestation of folks trying to get power and privilege aligned with whiteness,” said Yaba Blay, a researcher at North Carolina Central University.

“We’re seeing folks attempt to be perceived as having more value because of their complexion.”

Recent black movements are trying to challenge that perception.

#Melaninpoppin, a hashtag celebrating black skin, and the smash-hit movie “Black Panther,” which featured an almost all-black cast wearing African-inspired outfits and natural hair, are held up as testaments to a shift away from longstanding Eurocentric standards of beauty.

But whether the tide of opinion is turning in Africa itself is another question.

“The truth for me was that my beauty was more accepted abroad than at home,” said Ajuma Nasenyana, a model from northern Kenya, who has walked for Victoria’s Secret and Vivienne Westwood.

“In the African industry the lighter your skin tone the more beautiful you are. Hopefully the industry is changing and starting to appreciate darker skin.”

Sobande, the doctor, said, “We’re living in a more positive environment than a few years before.

“But it’s going to take a lot of effort to change the mindset.”

The 5.9-magnitude quake Thursday struck at a shallow depth in the northwest of the island, the US Geological Survey said, even as relief agencies raced to find survivors among wreckage from Sunday’s quake.

“The quake was felt strongly. There have been 355 aftershocks since Sunday,” national disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said.

Evacuees at a shelter in northern Lombok’s Tanjung district ran out onto the road crying and screaming, an AFP reporter at the scene said.

Motorcycles parked on the street toppled over and the walls of some nearby buildings collapsed.

A woman wearing a motorbike helmet was seen crying with her two daughters in her arms.

“We were stuck in the traffic while delivering aid, suddenly it felt like our car was hit from behind, it was so strong,” witness Sri Laksmi told AFP.

“People in the street began to panic and got out of their cars, they ran in different directions in the middle of the traffic.”

The aftershock comes after Sunday’s devastating 6.9-magnitude earthquake, which relief agencies said had wiped out entire villages in the worst-hit regions of northern and western Lombok.

A total of 164 people have been confirmed killed in Sunday’s quake, national disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho told AFP, with a further 1,400 seriously injured and more than 150,000 displaced.

Relief efforts had yet to reach parts of the island even before Thursday’s aftershock, Indonesian authorities said, with hopes fading of finding further survivors among the wreckage.

“The earthquake does not have any tsunami potential,” Hary Tirto Djatmiko, spokesman for Indonesia’s meteorology, climatology and geophysics agency (BMKG), said of Thursday’s aftershock.

“Over the coming weeks, people are still welcome to visit the two islands, but not the disaster areas. They can travel to other beautiful places in Bali and South Lombok,” Lilik said as quoted by kompas.com.

He added that the beautiful beaches in the southern parts of Lombok could still be visited, while urging tourists to remain cautious.

Lombok Island in West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) was struck by a magnitude-7 earthquake, which was also felt in nearby Bali, on Sunday evening.

“Bali is still safe, especially now that Mount Agung is on a level 3 alert. People only need to be more than 4 kilometers from the peak, which is the safest distance, according to data from the Volcanology and Geological Disaster Mitigation Center (PVMBG),” Lilik said.

Mt. Agung most recently erupted in July, following alerts and earlier eruptions late last year.

Read also: Tourism Crisis Center established in Lombok

Lilik said tourists should remain vigilant.

“We have actually mapped out all the potential disaster areas in Indonesia. Tourists must always be vigilant, so that they are not caught out when visiting a certain location.”

He denied rumors of an upcoming earthquake that could cause a tsunami, saying that the hoaxes and misinformation were intended to frighten tourists. A tsunami warning was issued but it was lifted shortly after the earthquake in Lombok.

Lilik added that the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) had an app, named Inarisk, which provided factual information on any potential disaster.

BNPB officials are currently working with airport authorities to promote the app so that tourists can gain access to the correct information.

“The app will provide instructions on what to do, where to go to and what sort of preparations are needed in case of a disaster,” Lilik said.

The app is available on Google Play for Android users, with both Indonesian and English versions.

Construction will begin in the third quarter of this year and the complex’s commercial operations are expected to start in the first half of 2023 to meet Viet Nam’s soaring demand, now at 2.3 million tonnes a year and projected to expand consistently thanks to the country’s strong economic growth.

Roongrote Rangsiyopash, president and CEO of SCG, said: “Long Son Petrochemicals is a world-scale petrochemical complex with an investment of $5.4 billion. It is SCG’s flagship investment.

“This venture will improve the competitive advantages of SCG’s chemicals business in Southeast Asia.

The US dollar loan deals are with Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, Mizuho Bank, Bangkok Bank, Krungthai Bank, Siam Commercial Bank, and the Export-Import Bank of Thailand.

The credit tenor is 14 years.

Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation is the project’s financial advisor.

LSP will come up in the southern province of Ba Ria – Vung Tau 100 kilometers from HCM City. It will have the capacity to produce 1.6 million tonnes of olefins a year for manufacturing high density polyethylene, linear low density polyethylene and polypropylene.

SCG, one of the leading conglomerates in the region, has three core businesses: cement-building materials, petrochemicals, and packaging.

Many frightened villagers are staying under tents or tarpaulins dotted along roads or in parched rice fields, and makeshift medical facilities have been set up to treat the injured.

Evacuees in some encampments say they are running out of food, while others are suffering psychological trauma after the powerful quake, which struck just one week after another tremor surged through the island and killed 17.

“The death toll rose to 164 people with at least 1,400 people seriously injured and 156,000 displaced,” national disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho told AFP.

Tens of thousands of homes, businesses and mosques were levelled by the quake, which struck on Sunday as evening prayers were being said across the Muslim-majority island.

Local authorities, international relief groups and the central government have begun organising aid, but shattered roads have slowed efforts to reach survivors in the mountainous north of Lombok, which bore the brunt of the quake.

“We are still waiting for assessments from some of the more remote areas in the north of the island, but it is already clear that Sunday’s earthquake was exceptionally destructive,” Christopher Rassi, the head of a Red Cross assessment team on Lombok, said in a statement.

He estimated 75 percent of houses are damaged in some villages in east and north Lombok.

“There are still some evacuees that have not yet been touched by aid, especially in North Lombok and West Lombok,” Nugroho tweeted Thursday.

Siraj Ibn Wahhaj, 40, was arrested along with four other people on Friday at the desert compound in Amalia, New Mexico, and has been charged with 11 counts of child abuse.

Eleven children aged one to 15 were found living on the compound in filthy conditions, prosecutors said, and Wahhaj is under investigation for the death of a 12th child — possibly his son — whose body was discovered on the property.

“Trip hazards, woods with nails sticking up, broken glass, bottles, and open trenches littered the property,” prosecutors said Wednesday in a court filing requesting that Wahhaj be held in custody.

“Trash scattered around the property, no clean water, no electricity, no indoor plumbing and the children were clothed in rags,” the filing said, adding that loaded firearms were also found at the compound.

Prosecutors quoted the foster parent of one of the children as claiming that Wahhaj “had trained the child in the use of an assault rifle in preparation for future school shootings.”

“(Wahhaj) poses a great danger to the children found on the property as well as a threat to the community as a whole due to the presence of firearms and his intent to use these firearms in a violent and illegal manner,” the court filing said.

Wahhaj is wanted in the state of Georgia for the alleged abduction of his four-year-old son. Authorities are investigating whether the remains found at the New Mexico compound are those of the missing boy.

Three women believed to be the mothers of the 11 children found at the compound were also arrested in Friday’s raid along with another man, Lucas Morten, and charged with child abuse.