Bali’s Karangasem regency still reportedly owes IDR1.4 billion (US$ 98,640) to Klungkung General Hospital for the treatment of Mount Agung evacuees in 2017. While Klungkung regent I Nyoman Suwirta has announced plans to wipe off those debts, the government in Karangasem recently said they are able to make the payment.

Yes, Indonesia this week almost passed a draconian revision to the country’s criminal code (a bill referred to in local media by the abbreviation RKUHP), that would have criminalized insulting the president and strengthened the country’s blasphemy laws, among many other controversial articles.

A prosecutor at the Denpasar Court yesterday demanded that Alexandru Boarta, a 32-year-old Romanian national who was arrested in March for attempting an ATM skimming scheme on the island, be sentenced to 1 year in prison.

A strong 6.5-magnitude earthquake hit off the remote Maluku islands in eastern Indonesia Thursday, US seismologists said, but no tsunami warning was issued.

The quake struck about 37 kilometers northeast of Ambon in Maluku province at 8:46 am local time, at a depth of 29 kilometers, according to the US Geological Survey.

Trash collection services might soon run into problems in Bali’s Karangasem regency as the local environmental agency says they’ve recently faced a IDR 700 million (US$50,000) cut to their budget. 

Wayan Sandi, who heads the trash and waste collection department at Karangasem regency’s Environmental Agency (DLH), told Tribun-Bali yesterday that the budget cut might impact trash collection services during the last two months of 2019.