CC......
TAL
BY BAG
CR 2/4821/75 IV
P MORGAN ESQ
UN DEPARTMENT FCO
HKK 243/1 EROVED IN REGISTRY BO. 51.
2 4 JUL 1978
DESK OFFICER
14 July 1978
.106)
REFUGEES FROM VIETNAMŃ
INDEX
Não
PA
REGISTRY Action Taken
हा
109
Thank you for your letter UNS 243/4 of 21 June. The background on U K policy which vas covered in your letter of 15 June to Hugh Davies in Singapore vas most useful:
and your kind remarks in para 4 of that letter about Hong Kong's response to the probles vere appreciated here. ve should, incidentally, be interested to know how many refugees from Vietnam have been accepted so far in the UK and how many of these were originally rescued by U K registered vessels.
2.
Your para 2: ve assumed from your decision in the SIBONGA" case that should the Government of the first scheduled port of call reject your guarantee (to accept refugees from a U I registered vessel if they had not been resettled elsewhere within three months) you would in practice be willing to accept them as soon as vas practicable, rather than telling the captain to try again somewhere else. It was perhaps misleading to refer to this as a "fallback" position. lowever, if we are right in thinking that you would not vish the refugees to be left on board indefinitely, our point is that we would prefer any transit arrangements to be made from the first port of call rather than (as in the case of the SIBONGA) from Hong Kong. We were, of course, willing to provide the transit facilities in that case because circumstances made it impossible for the Thai position to be fully tested before the ship sailed.
CC SEAD
H K & G Dept PCO
CON
(1 Corr)
LaL
123