Foreign and Commonwealth Office London SW1
Telephone 01- 930 8449
Miss Rona Moran
Amnesty-International,
Box 300 85
200 61 Malmo 30
Sweden
LAST
REF.
NEXI
REF.
271
Your reference
Our reference
Date
276
HKK 14/5
22 August 1974
Dear Madam
i
You wrote to the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary on 16 August on behalf of Amnesty International, Malmo, about the group of 118 illegal immigrants from South Vietnam who were returned from Hong Kong to Saigon on 17 June.
You suggest in your letter that the French Government and the Dutch section of Amnesty International had promised to take care of some members of the group. However, as the Parliamentary Under Secretary told Amnesty's Secretary General in a letter dated 14 August, we have been informed that the French Government did not make any offer to accept any of these people, Nor did the Dutch Government, and we have no information of any offer made by the Dutch section of Amnesty International.
The 118 were only returned to Saigon after the Vietnamese Government had given assurances that nothing serious would happen to members of the group who were victims of the syndicate which had smuggled them out of Vietnam, and that cases of violation of Vietnam's immigration/ emigration laws would be tried in open court and would not be harshly punished.
After the 118 had been repatriated, it was found that one member, who had given a false name in Hong Kong, had previously been condemned to death on smuggling charges. He has since been re-tried and sentenced, instead, to life imprisonment.
Twenty-seven of the remaining 117 (comprising women, children and old people) have now been released, and the remainder are being held in prisons in or near Saigon while they await trial. The group have thus all left Con Son Island.
You may know that, following further representations made on the group's behalf by HM Ambassador in Saigon, the Vietnamese Government issued on 30 July the following statement:-
"The British Ambassador called to express his Government's concern about the apparently conflicting press reports of the assurances given to the British and Hong Kong Governments about the 118 illegal immigrants repatriated from Hong Kong.
/The