VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Jakarta. The Industry Ministry is targeting to produce 600 thousand units of electric cars and 2.45 million units of battery-powered motorcycles in 2030.

The production target of battery-powered electric vehicles will hopefully be able to reduce CO2 emissions from cars by 2.7 million tons and from motorcycles by 1.1 million tons, Industry Minister Agus Gumiwang Kartasasmita said in a written statement released on Wednesday.

So far, three domestic companies have built facilities for manufacturing battery-powered electric vehicles, with a combined production capacity of 1,480 units per year, he informed.

To push the production of battery-powered electric vehicles, the government is providing fiscal and non-fiscal incentives to consumers as well as manufacturers, he said.

The incentives for consumers include zero percent luxury sale tax (PPnBM), a 10-percent cap on regional tax, zero percent down payment, low interest, electricity connection discount, special police number, among other things, the minister informed.

Meanwhile, the incentives for manufacturers cover tax holiday, mini tax holiday, tax allowance, import duty exemption, government-borne import duty, and super tax deduction for research, development, and demonstration (RD&D), he added.

"The automotive industry is one of the key sectors contributing significantly to the national economy. Right now, 21 four or more wheeled vehicle manufacturers are operating in Indonesia," he said.

Nearly 38 thousand workers are directly employed by the automotive industry and more than 1.5 million people are employed along the value chain of the industry, he pointed out.

"The production and wholesale of four or more wheeled vehicles in the January-February period reached 152 thousand units and 102 thousand units, respectively," Kartasasmita said.

To boost the sale of locally-made, four-wheeled motor vehicles with an engine capacity of up to 1,500 cc, the government has relaxed the government-borne luxury sale tax (PPnBM-DRP) from March 1 to December 31, 2021.

"Starting April 1 (2021), the relaxation will be expanded to (four-wheeled motor vehicles), with an engine capacity of up to 1,500 cc," the minister said.

Based on the new regulation to be issued, the local purchase of vehicles with engine capacity of below 1,500 cc will be lowered to 60 percent from 70 percent.

"The reduction of local purchase under the first phase of the sale luxury tax relaxation program will hopefully attract investors to increase investment for supply chain in Indonesia and will benefit the public and the government," Kartasasmita said.  (Antaranews)

Jakarta. No link has been found as yet between the suspected terrorists from the Jamaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD) group arrested in East Java and the group detained in Makassar, said police.

"Until now, there has been no connection between East Java and Makassar," said head of the public information bureau of the National Police's public relations division, Brigadier General Rusdi Hartono, at a press conference at the Police Headquarters here on Wednesday.

The JAD network in East Java was cut off from the JAD network operating in Makassar, South Sulawesi, he informed.

The Special Detachment (Densus) 88 anti-terror team of the Indonesian Police is investigating the role and activities of the JAD group in East Java.

"The group in East Java, even though they belong to the JAD group, is being investigated,” Hartono said.

Earlier, two suspected terrorists were arrested by the Densus 88 team in Tulungagung and Nganjuk in East Java province.

One of the two suspects, identified by his initials as MM (45), was arrested in Tulungagung and the second, identified as LAM (25), in Nganjuk. Both are believed to be members of the JAD group in the East Java region, Hartono said.

While making the arrests, police seized several pieces of evidence — two firearms, a laptop, a cellphone, and a book on "jihadist fiqh”, he informed.

"The Densus is currently studying to solve the problem of terrorism in East Java and in the country in general," Hartono remarked.

From February to March, 2021, a total of 22 suspected terrorists were arrested in East Java, he informed. They were believed to be members of the Fahim group, part of the Jemaah Islamiah (JI) group, which is affiliated with Al Qaeda, he added.

All suspected terrorists from East Java were brought to Jakarta for further legal proceedings on March 18, 2021. (Antaranews)

Jakarta. A woman shot dead by Indonesian police at the force’s national headquarters in an exchange of gunfire was a “lone wolf” who believed in Islamic State ideology, police chief Listyo Sigit Prabowo told a news conference on Wednesday.

The woman was 25 and she had posted an ISIS flag to her social media account hours before the attack, he said. (Reuters)

Jakarta.  The cockpit voice recorder (CVR) of the crashed Sriwijaya Air flight SJ-182 has been retrieved following a search extending more than two months, Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi informed on Wednesday.

"We can say what has been retrieved is (the result of) the effort to find better data," he said during a press briefing at the Jakarta International Container Terminal (JICT) II.

Without the CVR, the investigation into the cause of the plane crash in the waters off Seribu Islands cannot be completed, he pointed out.

With the retrieval of the CVR, both the black boxes of the Sriwijaya Air SJ-182 have been found.

"KNKT (the National Committee for Transportation Safety) has retrieved a lot of data from the flight data recorder (FDR). The data will be perfect if it is combined with what has been recorded in the CVR about the conversation between the pilot and co-pilot," Sumadi said.

The minister said he had reported the retrieval of the CVR to President Joko Widodo. The Transportation Ministry will hand over the CVR to the KNKT for further investigation, he added.

"Technically, we have reported (the CVR) to the President and will later hand it over to the KNKT for immediate follow-up. We hope the KNKT will conduct research in detail and classify the information found in the CVR," he remarked.

The Sriwijaya Air flight SJ-182, bearing the registration number PK-CLC, had lost contact on January 9, 2021 at 2:40 p.m. Western Indonesia time (WIB) shortly after take-off and crashed between Lancang Island and Laki Island, Thousand Islands, Jakarta. The plane had taken off from Jakarta and was headed to Pontianak.

Based on the manifest, the plane was carrying 50 passengers and 12 crew members on board. Of the total passengers, 40 were adults, seven were children, and three were infants.

All the passengers and crew members were killed in the crash.

The search operation for the Sriwijaya Air flight was officially ended on January 21, 2021, in accordance with the rules.

However, the search for the CVR memory had continued as it had gotten separated from its casing, which was retrieved on January 15, 2021.

After the search operation for the Sriwijaya Air flight was called off, the KNKT continued a manual search for the CVR.

"The search for the CVR memory has continued without the help of the underwater location beacon. So, we are searching for it ourselves on the seabed. That is the peculiar difficulty we are facing," KNKT chief Soerjanto Tjahjono had said during a hearing with Commission V of the House of Representatives (DPR) in Jakarta recently.

A CVR plays an important role in recording voices from four canals in an airplane — voice from the pilot's microphone, voice from the co-pilot's microphone, voice from the cockpit, and the reserved canal (cockpit and cabin interphone).

"FDR and CVR are important components in an investigation since they record flight data such as time, altitude, speed, coordinates and so on," he added.

The FDR of SJ-182 was located on January 12, 2021, three days after the plane crashed and was retrieved the following day. (Antaranews)