:
AIDE MEMOIRE HANDED TO MURRAY ON 3 WAY
UN
HIGH COMMISSIONER FOR REFUGEES BY SIR J
Нек
Hex 243)1
RO.
625
The United Kingdom Mission to the United Nations have been
F
asked by the Hong Kong authorities to do what they can to ensure that instructions are issued to the MICR presente in
روری
Apresen
Hong Kong:
(a)
to expedite acceptance into his care of refugees;
(b)
to lift his refusal to accept any who have come via
China;
(c)
to collaborate with the Hong Kong authorities in a
crash programme to accommodate present and expected
numbers (which are likely to total 40,000 by July).
As regards refugees who have come via China, some
amplification may be helpful. Refugees have never been detained
in Hong Kong because of any doubt about their status as refugees.
In November 1978 some were for the first time detained because
there was 1 slight possibility of persuading the Chinese to accept
back a group for whom there was some evidence of time spent in
China. The Chinese reply, when it finally came, was that none of
the cases presented proved to have been settled in China: China
would, however, be willing to consider accepting back those for
whom there was such evidence. The UNHCR investigating team, which
has just concluded six weeks work in Hong Kong, has not to the best
of the knowledge of the Hong Kong authorities discovered any better
evidence than the Hong Kong authorities themselves. The central
point is that all those in question have fled from Vietnam and the
Hong Kong authorities do not distinguish between them and refugees
who have come direct by boat.
Ambassador Clark told the Governor of Hong Kong on 26 April
that he saw no difficulty for the United States in principle in
/accepting