News, Articles & Reviews

Belum lama, foto bugil aktris Vanessa Hudgens beredar di internet. Bintang 'High School Musical 3: Senior Year' itu pun menyalahkan dua orang teman yang telah mengambil gambar bugilnya.

Selain foto bugil dirinya, ada juga foto Vanessa saat mencium teman perempuannya Alexa Nikolas dan Kayslee. Awalnya mantan kekasih Zac Efron itu meminta FBI untuk menyelidiki hacker yang diduga membocorkan foto-fotonya ke internet.

Seperti dilansir Aceshowbiz, akhirnya Vanessa menyadari kalau orang yang mempunyai akses terhadap foto-foto tersebut hanyalah dua orang temannya. Aktris kelahiran 14 Desember 1988 itu menduga kalau Alexa dan Kayslee iri dengan kesuksesan kariernya.


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It`s Paolo, not Paul. Italian media claimed as their own the "psychic" octopus who accurately predicts World Cup results after his trainer in Germany on Sunday revealed he was caught in Italian waters.

"The octopus` name is Paolo," wrote sports newspaper Tuttosport on its website.

The news is "a small satisfaction for Italy at the end of a tournament that has given the Azzurri very little joy," wrote daily Il Corriere della Sera on its website.

Verena Bartsch, the octopus` trainer told the Sunday edition of Germany`s Bild tabloid newspaper that she caught him in April in the sea off the Italian island of Elba, near Tuscany. He was four weeks old at the time.

Bartsch`s version conflicts with Paul`s official biography, according to which the octopus is two years old and came from Weymouth, England, before moving to an aquarium in western Germany.

Paul has accurately predicted seven out of seven games from his aquarium home, where he is given two boxes, each containing a mussel and the flag of the two competing World Cup teams.

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The Organization of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA) is holding a workshop on the Role of Media in Preserving the Global Environment, here, May 13-15, coinciding with the implementation of the World Ocean Conference (WOC) which is also being organized here, May 11-14.

North Sulawesi Governor Sinyo Sarundajang was scheduled to officially open the workshop here on Wednesday, Saiful Hadi, OANA Secretary General, said here on Wednesday.

The OANA Workshop is organized by the OANA Secretariat in ANTARA News Agency, with the cooperation of the Foreign Affairs Ministry and the Communication and Informatics Ministry of Indonesia.

Around 25 journalists from OANA member agencies, such as from ANTARA (Indonesia), Bernama (Malaysia), Kyodo (Japan), Yonhap (South Korea), VNA (Vietnam), QNA (Qatar) and Xinhua (China), are participating the workshop.

Journalists from EFE of Spain, Venezuela, Cuba, Canada, Suriname, Chile, Brazil, Colombia, and Argentine, who group in the Journalist Visit program, also are attending the workshop.

Speakers and resource persons will include Indonesian Minister of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Fredy Number, Minister of the Environment Dr. Rachmat Witoelar, UNESCO Program Specialist for Environment Sciences Robert Lee, Minister of Communication and Informatics Dr Muhammad Nuh, Minister of Foreign Affairs Dr. Hassan Wirajuda, Google`s Chief Technology Advocate (Google Earth) Michael Jones, and Prof. Tridoyo Kusumastanto of the Bogor Institute of Agriculture.

In the last day of the workshop, the journalists will join a field visit to Bunaken marine park, around 10 km of Manado, to see the rich marine biodiversity of the protected marine park.

The Indonesian Government is organizing the WOC (May 11-14) and the Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI) Summit (May 15) in Manado to discuss issues on the climate change and the oceans.

OANA, which was established in 1961 with the support of UNESCO, now has 40 member news agencies from 33 countries.

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Scientists said Sunday they had uncovered new marine animals in their search of previously unexplored Australian waters, along with a bizarre carnivorous sea squirt and ocean-dwelling spiders.

A joint US-Australian team spent a month in deep waters off the coast of the southern island of Tasmania to "search for life deeper than any previous voyage in Australian waters," lead researcher Ron Thresher said.

What they found were not only species new to science -- including previously undescribed soft corals -- but fresh indications of global warming's threat to the country's unique marine life.

Blogging on board the ship, researcher Adam Subhas said the team witnessed some "cool biology" as they descended the fracture, including the sea squirt, which he described as "basically an underwater Venus fly trap, but much bigger."

The sea squirt, also known as an ascidian, stands 50 centimetres tall on the sea floor at a depth of just over 4,000 metres. It traps prey in its funnel-like front section if they touch it when they swim past.

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Los Angeles (ANTARA News) - Hollywood heart-throb Hugh Jackman has become the first Australian to be crowned "Sexiest Man Alive" by People magazine, it was announced on Wednesday.

Jackman, 40, who stars alongside Nicole Kidman in Baz Luhrmann's sweeping epic "Australia" due for release in the United States next week, beat out a slew of rivals including Javier Bardem, David Beckham and Daniel Craig.

People described Jackman on its website as a 6ft 2in brawny triple threat who can "sing, dance, and wield a weapon."

Screen siren and co-star Kidman was quoted as saying that Jackman left people stammering: "Oh ... My ... God."

"Women's jaws drop when Hugh walks into a room," Kidman added of Jackman, who has been married to Australian actress Deborra-Lee Furness, for 12 years.

Jackman was quoted by AFP as telling People his wife had joked with him after being informed of the accolade. "God bless her, she said, 'I could've told them that years ago!' And then she said, 'Obviously, Brad (Pitt) wasn't available this year.'"

Jackman is best known for his role as Wolverine in the trio of successful Hollywood films based on the "X-Men" comic book series.

He also starred as Vampire hunter in the "Van Helsing" films and has completed filming on "X-Men" spin-off Wolverine.

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The crew of seven astronauts that will make the trip to the International Space Station in two weeks' time went aboard the US space shuttle Endeavour two days ago, on October 29th, for their first practice run. The series of training sessions they have started is aimed at preparing them for the flight and for the 15 days they will spend in space. The goal of the mission is to adapt the ISS for a larger crew, upgrading the number of its beds from three to five and adding another toilet.

For now, the launch date is set for November 14, but whether this is accurate or not remains to be seen on Thursday, when NASA officials announce the date the space shuttle takes off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, based on their reviews on the preparation progress. The crew will spend 11 of the 15 days docked by the ISS. For three of its members, Robert S. (Shane) Kimbrough, Endeavour's pilot Eric A. Boe and flight engineer Stephen G. Bowen, it will be the first time ever to enter the spacecraft with the occasion of the dressing rehearsal.

Other members of the mission are astronauts Sandra H. Magnus (who will replace Station Flight Engineer and Science Officer Gregory E. Chamitoff, who has been aboard the ISS since this May), Christopher J. Ferguson, Donald R. Pettit, and lead spacewalker Heidemarie M. Stefanyshyn-Piper. Besides providing more beds, a toilet and a wastewater recycling system for the ISS, the mission also attempts to service solar arrays that provide solar energy for the station.


In their statement on Wednesday, NASA officials also announced that, despite the opinion of its engineers, the new Ares I spacecraft that would replace the shuttle by 2015 registers a satisfactory progress, and that the reports of faults and errors in its design, while somewhat expected, were highly exaggerated. “We haven't done something of this magnitude in over three decades,” shared the deputy associate administrator for NASA's exploration program, Doug Cooke.

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Big or small, mosquitoes are pesky. But it's the little ones that you really need to watch out for, a new study finds.

Scientists measured mosquitoes' wings, then fed them blood that packed the dengue virus (which causes dengue fever, a disease found in the tropics and Africa). The smaller bugs were more likely to become infected and therefore more likely to transmit disease.

The study, led by Barry Alto of the Illinois Natural History Survey, a division of the University of Illinois Institute for Natural Resource Sustainability, is detailed in the November issue of the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.

The tests were done on both Asian tiger mosquitoes and yellow fever mosquitoes. Both pests are found in the United States and throughout the world and are the two main transmitters of dengue virus. The size factor held up for both.

"Only slight differences in the body sizes of these mosquitoes drastically alter their potential to transmit viruses causing human disease," the researchers said in a statement today.

The finding may prove fortuitous: Larvacides that aim to kill mosquito larvae don't always kill them all, but they result in less competition among those that remain, meaning bigger mosquitoes, which may be less able to transmit infections.

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The O'Brien County sheriff's office is looking for the owner of two unusual four-legged creatures found wandering on a golf course in Primghar. Two hinnies, a cross between a stallion and a female donkey, were found about two weeks ago.

Deputy Dean Fjeld said officials corralled the pair and took them a city pasture. So far, no one has claimed them.

Fjeld said if the owners don't show up, there's a chance the animals could be auctioned.

Fjeld said it's possible the animals were abandoned because of tough financial times.

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STOCKHOLM - Sweden's own version of the Loch Ness monster, the Storsjoe or Great Lake monster, has been caught on film by surveillance videos, an association that installed the cameras said Friday.

The legend of the Swedish beast has swirled for nearly four centuries, with some 200 sightings reported in the lake in central Sweden.

"On Thursday at 12:21 pm, we filmed the movements of a live being. And it was not a pike, nor a perch, we're sure of that," Gunnar Nilsson, the head of a shopkeepers' association in Svenstavik, told AFP.

The association, together with the Jaemtland province and local municipality of Berg, installed six surveillance cameras in the lake in June, including two underwater devices.

The project, which has so far cost some 400,000 kronor (43,000 euros, 62,500 dollars), is aimed at resolving the mystery of the Swedish Nessie.

In the images filmed Thursday and posted on a website dedicated to the Storsjoe monster (www.storsjoodjuret.nu), a long serpent-like being is seen swimming in the murky waters.

Some 20 more cameras are due to be installed soon, including one at a depth of 30 metres (100 feet) to catch any movements under the winter ice.

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Friday, August 1 is a red-letter day for eclipse enthusiasts. On that date, the sun will be partially eclipsed over an immense area that includes western and central Asia, parts of northern and central Europe, all of Greenland and even a small slice of northeastern North America.

A total solar eclipse — the first in nearly two and a half years — will be visible along a narrow track that will start over the Northwest Passage of Canada, gives a glancing blow to northern Greenland, then shifts southeast through Siberia and western Mongolia and before ending near the famed Silk Route of China.

The path of totality for this upcoming eclipse is never more than 157 miles (252 km) wide.

Where it's visible

The total eclipse begins at sunrise over Northern Canada's Queen Maud Gulf, where the moon's umbra will first touch down on the Earth, resulting in Canada's hosting its first total solar eclipse since February 26, 1979.

As the sun comes into view over the north-northeast horizon its disk will become completely blocked by the moon. This is in the area of the famous Northwest Passage, a sea route connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans through the Arctic archipelago of Canada. The various islands of the archipelago are separated from one another and the Canadian mainland by a series of Arctic waterways collectively known as the Northwestern Passages. Politically, this region belongs to Nunavut, the largest and newest of the territories of Canada; it was separated officially from the vast Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999.

Although the umbral shadow narrowly misses the towns of Cambridge Bay on Victoria Island, and Resolute on Cornwallis Island, its northern edge just clips the northernmost permanently inhabited place in the world: Canada's remote outpost of Alert, which lies just 508 miles (817 km) from the North Pole and has a population of just 5. Here, totality will last 43 seconds.

Crossing the open Arctic, the southern half of the totality path slides across the many fjords of northermost Greenland, coming to within 450 miles (720 km) of the North Pole at 9:38 UT over the Arctic Ocean before turning southeast. Totality sweeps over the Norwegian island group of Svalbard, while the northern edge of the umbra's path just grazes Russia's Franz Josef Land island group, then cuts across the crescent-shaped island of Novaya Zemlya on its way to central Asia. The umbra first touches the Russian coast on the Yamal Peninsula. Not far inland, greatest eclipse, producing 2 minutes 27 seconds of totality, is attained near the town of Nadym (pop. ~46,000), just inland from the boot-shaped Gulf of Obskaja.

Spending part of your summer in Siberia may sound a bit more appealing upon hearing that the central path passes almost directly over the city of Novosibirsk, Russia's third most populous city (pop. ~1.4 million) where totality begins at 10:44 UT and will last 2 minutes 18 seconds. The center of the path will then follow the Mongolia-China border for several hundred kilometers, with Olgij, Mongolia getting 1 min 36s of totality. Totality finally whisks into north-central China, crossing the west end of the Great Wall before leaving the Earth at a point northeast of the major city of Xi'an (pop. 3.9 million).

The northern half of Maine as well as the Canadian Maritime Provinces will experience a partial eclipse at sunrise.

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A total solar eclipse Aug. 1 will be seen only by a handful of observers lucky enough to be in the path, which starts in Canada and runs across the Arctic, through Russia and into China.

For those select few, day will turn to night, the stars will come out (weather permitting), and the moon's blackout of the sun will provide a dazzling visual spectacle that skywatchers will never forget.

The celestial alignment will create a partial eclipse visible across a broader area, including the far northeastern corner of North America and most of Europe and Asia.

Many people go a lifetime never witnessing a total solar eclipse. And in fact we happen to live in a rare moment in the 4.5-billion-year history of our planet when total solar eclipses are just barely possible due to some remarkable solar system alignments.

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BEIJING (Reuters) - Beijing has asked hotels and restaurants in the city to take dog meat off the menu for the duration of next month's Olympics and September's Paralympics.

Dog is eaten not only by the large Korean community in China's capital but is also popular in Yunnan and Guizhou restaurants.

A directive from the Beijing Food Safety Office issued last month ordered Olympic contractor hotels not to provide any dishes made with dog meat and said any canine material used in traditional medicated diets must be clearly labeled.

Concerned that canine dishes might offend animal rights groups and Western visitors, Beijing said restaurants expected to be popular among foreign visitors must stop serving dog meat "to respect the dining customs of different countries."

The directive "advocated" that all restaurants serving dog suspend it during the Olympics but made no mention of the many popular establishments with donkey on the menu.

Criticism from Westerners caused the dog meat-loving South Koreans to ban canine dishes for a period of time during the 1988 Seoul Olympics.

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AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A newborn red panda rejected by its mother in Amsterdam's Artis zoo has been adopted by a domestic cat, the zoo said Friday. The cat is nursing the red panda, currently about the size of a kitten, along with her own four kittens, the zoo said.

The red panda was born on June 30 and rejected by its mother soon afterwards. Red pandas look like raccoons and when fully grown are slightly larger than a domestic cat -- substantially smaller than the black and white giant panda.

"They are skilful climbers that, when not foraging on the ground, spend most of their time in the trees curled up with their long, bushy tails wrapped around their heads," the World Wildlife Fund conservation charity said on its website.

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London (ANTARA News) - A British teenager has said she was "shaking head to toe" when she discovered a baby bat curled up in her bra after investigating "vibrations" she believed to have come from her mobile phone.

Abbie Hawkins, 19, of Norwich, south-east England, said she was quietly doing her job as a hotel receptionists when she decided to examine the "strange movements" in her underwear.

"I put my hand down my bra and pulled out a cuddly little bat. It looked cosy and comfortable and I was sorry for disturbing it," she was quoted by DPA as saying according to press reports Wednesday.

Hawkins said she was shocked but felt bad for removing the "cuddly bat" from its cosy position in the bra padding.

"That shocked me very much at the time, but it scuttled off under the desk into the dark. I was shaking from head to toe," reported Hawkins.

"It looked quite cosy and comfortable in there so it was quite rude of me to take it out. I felt quite sorry for it. Perhaps I should have left it there and given it a good home."

Hawkins explained that the undergarment had been in her bedroom drawer after being washed the day before, but she had not noticed anything when putting it on.

"When I was driving to work, I felt a slight vibration but I thought it was just my mobile phone in my jacket pocket."

The bat was captured by one of her colleagues and released.

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JAKARTA, JUMAT -- Menjadi seorang public figure kata bintang sinetron Sandra Dewi bukan perkara gampang. Sebab, masyarakat tentu saja akan mengarahkan perhatiannya kepada si public figure.

Itu pula yang terjadi kepada diri Sandra Dewi, setelah namanya mulai berkibar di dunia hiburan. "Banyak hal yang harus saya perhatikan. Dari mulai penampilan sampai menjaga sikap. Jadi, jangan aneh-aneh deh," tegas Sandra usai didaulat menjadi ikon Felice Jewerly menggantikan Sophia Latjuba di Plaza Senayan, Jakarta, Jumat (4/7).

Soal penampilan, kata pemilik nama lengkap Monica Nicholle Sandra Dewi Gunawan Basri itu, tentu saja harus mendapat perhatian lebih. Meski juga tak harus berlebihan. "Sekarang saya harus pandai-pandai merawat diri. Padahal sebenarnya dulu, aku nggak terlalu pintar merawat diri. Dulu aku ini orangnya tomboy," ujarnya usai ditunjuk menjadi ikon salah satu produk perhiasan di kawasan Plaza Senayan, Jakarta, Jumat (4/7).

Soal perawatan diri, Sandra memilih yang sedang-sedang saja. "Nggak terlalu berlebihan juga. Yang penting bagaimana bisa tampil cantik. Kalau kita cantik, yang lain juga pasti ingin ikutan cantik," katanya.

Ditanya soal perhiasaan, Sandra mengaku termasuk pecinta perhiasan. "Buat aku perhiasaan itu sahabat terbaik perempuan. Selaian bikin perempuan tambah cantik, tapi juga punya nilai investasi," katanya.

"Kalau beli paling patungan sama keluarga. Jadi kalau pakai kan bisa keroyokan. Tukar-tukaran sama adik," tambahnya lagi.Bagaimana dengan mas Jawa? "Itu yang sulit. Sampai sekarang belum dapat-dapat. Masih jomblo mas," ujar Sandra polos.

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Jakarta:“We have hired 15 lawyers,” said Indonesian Consumers Foundation management, Tulus Abadi, at a public discussion on the subject in Jakarta yesterday. The number 204/Pdt/G/2008 lawsuit was registered at the Central Jakarta State Court.

They called on the President and the DPR to immediately ratify the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) and continue the discussion on Tobacco Effect Control Regulation Plan. As support of their case, the plaintiffs will submit the link between tobacco and poverty, Tulus added.

The cigarette industry is seen to be exploiting national poverty. About 73,8 percent of poor urban fathers have become smokers. They spend 22 percent more of their income on cigarettes than rice every week.

The Forum’s chairman, Tubagus Haryo Karbyanto, said that in 2006, cigarettes represented the second highest advertiser (valued at Rp 1,6 trillion), following cell phones. A year later, cigarette ads came down to number three (RP 1,5 trillion), after cell phones and motorcycle ads. The Indonesian government participated in the FCTC discussions in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1999 until 2003. However, he said, “Indonesia is the only South East Asia country that has not signed the FCTC.”

Indonesia Parliament Forum chairperson, Sri Utari Setyawati, stated that the Bill on the Control of Tobacco Effects on Health (RUU) is supported by 257 DPR members. “This Bill is similar in substance to the FCTC,” said Utari.

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BEULAH, N.D. - Oscar Stohler was raised in a sod house in western North Dakota and ranched there for nearly seven decades. He never gave much thought to what lay below the grass that fattened his cattle.

When oilmen wanted to drill there last year, Stohler, 83, doubted oil would be found two miles underground on his property. He even joked about it.

"I told them if they hit oil, I was going to buy a Cadillac convertible and put those big horns on the front and wear a 10-gallon hat," Stohler recalled.

He still drives his old pickup and wears a mesh farm cap — but it's by choice.

In less than a year, Stohler and his wife, Lorene, 82, have become millionaires from the production of one well on their land near Dunn Center, a mile or so from the sod home where Oscar grew up. A second well has begun producing on their property and another is being drilled — all aimed at the Bakken shale formation, a rich deposit that the U.S. Geological Survey calls the largest continuous oil accumulation it has ever assessed.

Landowners in western North Dakota have a much better chance of striking it rich from oil than they do playing the lottery, say the Stohlers. Some of their neighbors in the town of about 120, from bar tenders to Tupperware salespeople, have become "overnight millionaires" from oil royalty payments.

"It's the easiest money we've ever made," said Lorene Stohler, who worked for decades as a sales clerk at a small department store.

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In a move that will inevitably increase speculation that Prince William may soon announce his engagement to Kate Middleton, Mandrake hears that he has requested his own personal spin-doctor.

"William wants to start having more say over his own life and thinks that a dedicated press officer could help him achieve that," one of the Prince's chums tells me.

William, who turned 26 last weekend, has completed his basic training with the Royal Navy, with whom he is undertaking a two-month attachment. He recently spent 24 hours on a nuclear-
powered submarine as it took part in wargames, and will join the frigate HMS Iron Duke, on duty in the North Atlantic, for five weeks.

The press officer would cover William's Royal engagements but would, inevitably, have to handle inquiries about his private life.

Kate, 26, whom the Prince met while they were both students at St Andrews University, has attended a number of important events over recent months, including the ceremony at RAF Cranwell, in Lincolnshire, in April, at which William received his "wings".

The couple separated for a period of a few weeks last year, after William began his military service, but Kate since appears to have taken on a more prominent role in his life. There has been intense speculation that the couple will announce their engagement towards the end of this year, with the wedding held in the spring.

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NEW YORK - Health officials are trying to persuade doctors to offer HIV tests to nearly every patient in a New York City community hit harder than most by AIDS.

Under a new program announced Thursday, officials have set an ambitious goal of testing a quarter million adults in the Bronx, one of five boroughs that make up New York City, within three years.

"We need every single individual to know their status," said Dr. Monica Sweeney, an assistant health commissioner who specializes in HIV prevention.

Like dozens of other states, New York now requires doctors to obtain a patient's written consent and provide a brief counseling session before giving them a test for the AIDS virus, a process that can take up to 20 minutes. That's enough to deter doctors and nurses from suggesting HIV tests to patients routinely, according to the city.

Now officials want health clinics to offer the tests to anyone who seeks care, even for something as simple as a broken wrist.

Federal health officials recommended routine HIV testing for all Americans ages 13 to 64 nearly two years go, but the effort has stalled. Some doctors have questioned whether so much testing is necessary, or worth the bureaucratic cost.

HIV testing in the Bronx is already fairly widespread. Nearly 7 of 10 Bronx adults have been tested at least once in their lifetime. But as many as 250,000 adults have never been tested, and statistics indicate that many are diagnosed far too late.

AIDS killed 357 residents of the borough in 2006, about a third of all AIDS deaths in the city.

City health officials have also urged changes in state law that would do away with both the consent form and the mandated counseling sessions, arguing that they have little benefit. Those changes have been opposed by some AIDS activists.

"We find that period of time extremely useful," said Marjorie Hill, chief executive officer of the Gay Men's Health Crisis.

She said it gives doctors a time to talk with patients about ways to avoid HIV, or deal with an HIV infection.

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Jakarta:This is based on Presidential Instruction 2/2008 regarding energy and water reductions. This was mentioned during the socialization of the Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM) Department’s energy reduction program today (25/6) at Jakarta City Hall.

According to Mining Office Head Peni Susant, Jakarta would be a model for national energy conservation. “The target is 20 percent,” he said. Peni explained that energy consumption in the capital city was huge with 18 percent of national electricity being consumed in Jakarta. To change the public’s mindset, in government offices in particular, he said, the government through the ESDM department was socializing how to reduce energy use.

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