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In April this year, the UNIICR made an appeal for aid for the most seriously affected refugees in the Horn of Africa, to which HMG contributed £750,000. At the same time, HMG gave £100,000 in response to an interim appeal from the ICRC for refugees in the area. A further £150,000 has been given to the ICRC following a subsequent appeal aimed at sustaining their work throughout the Horn of Africa including both sides of the conflict in Eritrea. Additionally £25,000 has been made available by HMG to help meet the cost of transport of material relief provided by British voluntary agencies.
Displaced Persons in Cyprus
Forceful exchanges between the representatives of Greece and Turkey and the "observer" from Cyprus are becoming a feature of UNHCR Executive Committee meetings. The UK delegation should avoid being drawn into these. A short description of the prob- lem of displaced persons in Cyprus is contained in Annex VI.
Indo-Chinese Refugees
In discussiong this problem, the UK delegation should be guided by the following background:
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Following the collapse of the non-communist regimes in South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, large numbers of people have left these countries as refugees. The majority have been resettled in countries outside South East Asia, primarily in the United States and in France. But some 115,000 of them are currently housed in camps in Thailand and the numbers there have been growing at the rate of around 2,500 a month. In addition, 1975 over 40,000 Vietnamese have escaped in small boats and fetched up elsewhere in Asia (including Australia) or been picked up by passing ships. UNHCR have already resettled over 20,000 of these. More Vietnamese are likely to have tried to escape and failed or were drowned at sea. They were still arriving at various ports during the summer of 1978 at a rate of over 3,000 a month. Large numbers of these "boat refugees" or "boat people" as they have become known, are waiting in camps in the region, primarily in Malaysia, Hong Kong and Thailand, without offers of resettlement. Apart from the Vietnamese "boat refugees", a new refugee problem is posed by 100,000- 150,000 Cambodians who have fled to Vietnam. The Vietnamese Government has sought UNHCR's help with their resettlement.
South East Asian countries have been generally unwilling to allow "boat people" to settle in their countries or even, in many cases, to land. UNHCR has appealed to governments of countries bordering the South China Sea to adopt a more liberal asylum policy, and has maintained close contact with the governments of countries of possible resettlement. The High Commissioner visited certain South East Asian countries in September this year.
CONFIDENTIAL
The UK