Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad, Malaysia’s minister of natural resources, environment and climate change, said in an interview with Reuters he had asked his Indonesian counterpart to address the haze, as air quality worsens, adding that haze should not be a new normal.

“I do not know on what basis Malaysia uses to give such a statement. We are working not based upon Malaysia’s request,” Indonesia’s environment minister, Siti Nurbaya, told Reuters.

Fires that sent haze billowing across the region in 2015 and 2019 burned millions of hectares of land and produced record-breaking emissions, according to scientists.

Almost every dry season, smoke from fires to clear land for palm oil, and pulp and paper plantations in Indonesia blankets much of the region, bringing health risks and is a major concern to tourist operators and airlines.

Siti Nurbaya also said the number of forest fires in some parts of Sumatra and Borneo had declined and the government continues to put out the blazes.

Her remarks came as Southeast Asian agriculture and forestry ministers agreed to take collective action to minimise and eventually eliminate crop burning in the region.

In a statement after an Asean meeting in Malaysia, members recognised “the adverse environmental and health impacts of crop burning practices,” and committed to collectively reduce and phase it out.