BRIZAIN TO DIT 1,500 INDO-CHIME RFUGEES
to be issued at 2.30 My on 17 Jan...
ол
1979
(
A further 1,500 Vietnamese former boat refugees from among those at present in
Hong Kong, Malaysia and Thailand who are awaiting resettlement, are to be admitted to
Britain over the next 12 to 15 months, the Home Secretary, the Rt Hon Merlyn Rees MP
announced in a Written Answer, today (January
1979).
A copy of the Home Secretary's answer to Mr
for
is attached.
MP
This decision is in response to urgent appeals by the Government of Hong Kong, and the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to relieve the increasing refugce.
problem in the Far East. Of the 1,500 refugees, 1,000 will be drawn from Hong Kong
and the remainder in equal proportions from those in a similar situation in Malaysia
and Thailand. At present there are some 50,000 boat refugees from Vietnam in camps
in Malaysia and some 3,600 in Thailand. (In Thailand there are altogether estimated to be about 138,000 refugees, most of whom crossed overland from Laos, Cambodia and
Vietnam.) On 16 January there were 5,405 refugees from Vietnam in Hong Kong awaiting
resettlement. The numbers departing for resettlement have not kept pace with the
number arriving in those territories.
As explained by the Home Secretary in reply to a Written Question from Mr Peter
Bottomley MP on 8 December 1978* and Lord Harris in a reply to Lord Elton on
2 August 1978, at present Vietnamese refugees (in common with other refugees from
Indo-China) are accepted for settlement in the UK under two headings
either because
they have some connection with this country, or, because they have been rescued at
sea by a ship registered at a port in the UK and they cannot be accepted elsewhere.
(The recent arrival of refugees picked up by MV "Well Park" came within the latter
category.)
*Official Report c.817-8
*orricial kort c.1405-6