CONFIDENTIAL
3
to I
stranded in Hong Kong. In our telegram No. 539 of 27 May this year we agreed that this quota should be used for Vietnamese refugees from other parts of South-East Asia. What is HMG's present attitude to future requests from Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong to go to the UK? There are none such at the moment. Never- theless, after another few months, some of the 200 or so who look like being stranded here might well prefer to go to the UK. I need hardly add that an offer by the Home Office of, say, 50 places for family groups, would be very helpful locally. As you know, it is hard to explain to the public why we accept Vietnamese refugees but turn back illegal immigrants from China. An offer to accept some of the refugees in Britain would show that the UK is doing something to help. It would also help demonstrate to the Americans that they are not being left alone to carry the burden and would then help us when trying to persuade them to speed up their own procedures. Incidentally, it would also be helpful for me if you could let me know how many Vietnamese refugees the UK has already accepted.
7.
One final point. You will see from the statistics that there are still six refugees from the "Clara Maersk" (which landed a large number of refugees here in May 1975) who want to be repatriated to Vietnam. There were originally nine but three, after dithering for some time, have now changed their minds. I under- stand that when this problem was raised in Hanoi in 1975 the Vietnamese were not very receptive and our Embassy suggested that we should not press them, particularly since the refugees would probably suffer if they did return. However, the six have remained constant in their wish to return and it is difficult to see why we should attempt to frustrate their wishes. As for the Vietnamese, we could surely point out that Hong Kong is already taking a large number of those who say they wish to come to Hong Kong from the South; why should they not reciprocate in a very small way. They might also be given a hint that to have some refugees returning to Vietnam would be good for their image abroad. Indeed, I see from the latest issue of the Far Eastern Economic Review (16 December) that Hoang Tung, a member of the Central Committee said in an interview that : "We will give them (refugees) facilities to come back". As to the mechanics of the operation, if they could be given re-entry permits for Vietnam we could put them on one of our flights which pick up people from Saigon. If we do it this way we would of course have to sort out the problem quickly before the flights end. I would be grateful to have your views, and those of pur Embassy in Hanoi, on this.
ever
(D C Wilson)
d
CONFIDENTIAL/Copied to