Indonesia could lose 2,000 islands: official

Rising sea levels could inundate about 2,000 of Indonesia's 18,000 islands by 2030, and rice shortages are expected next year due to wild weather blamed on climate change, the environment minister said yesterday.

The assessment by Rachmat Witoelar was the government's bleakest yet of global warming's potential effects on the Southeast Asian archipelagic nation.

"It is very, very serious," Witoelar said at a news conference attended by Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the UN climate treaty secretariat.