1
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6 January 1979
1
Thank you for your letter of 29 December which was passed to me through the High Commissioner's local representative, Mr Angelo Rasanaya gan.
I appreciate your remarks about the efforts we have made to provide emergency aid for those on board the Huey Fong in the form of medical care, food, water and clothing.
Since the problem of boat refugees began to assume serious proportions in 1976, we have followed the policy of accepting, under guarantees of maintenance and resettlement from the UNHCR, all those shipwreck survivors who are picked up by ships which have Hong Kong as their
call. We
We have applied the same policy to those who arrive in our waters from Vietnam on small bonts direct. In 1978, we allowed over five thousand residents of Vietnam to be landed temporarily under this policy. I would like to record my gratitude to the UNHCR for what they have done in looking after and arranging the resettlement of those refugees. Unfortunately, despite these efforts, over half of those who arrived here in 1978 have already been awaiting resettlement for longer than the three-month period originally agreed as the limit of their temporary stay.
In addition, we have, during the past two years, brought here by special flights from Ho Chi Minh City over four and a half thousand residents of Vietnam who had a claim to come to Hong Kong. To these must be added over five thousand we allowed to remain here at the time of the communist victory in South Vietnam.
All these numbers have to be set against the background of the small size of Hong Kong, its large population and a rapidly increasing rate of immigration from China.
Last yær alone we had to absorb about one hundred thousand new arrivals from China.
Dale 8 De Haan Esq
Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees
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