(1129A
9/1
CONFIDENTIAL
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British Embassy
3100 Massachusetts Avenue NW Washington DC 20008
Telex Domestic USA 89-2370/89-2384
Telex International 64224(WUI)/248308(RCA)/440015(ITT) Telephone (202) 462-1340
anding 10.7
2
1)
40015(11
A glance.
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812.7.
Your reference
"
با ناشی
A M Simons Esq
South East Asian Dept
Dur reference
FCO
FA 021/12
LONDON SW 1
Date
18 June, 1979
Dear Murug
INDEX
9 N Slike.~
CL
De Hoaxe
f
Res D
2-316
US POLICY TOWARDS SOUTH EAST ASIA
NawD
FED
Plamming
UND Staff EESD
athenes
23.6
1.
As reported in our telegram No 1487, Dick Holbrooke testified on 13 June before the East Asia and Pacific sub-committee of the House Foreign Affairs Committee on the current situation in Indo-China. Although the hearing had been arranged some time ago, the recent acceleration of the refugee exodus from Indo-China meant that a great deal of the questions were directed towards the Administration's views on the refugee problem. Nonetheless, I think that you will find the enclosed copy of Holbrooke's prepared testimony interesting, both because it contains the most comprehensive account we have seen of US/Vietnamese exchanges on normalisation from 1977 to the present, and 'because it affords some useful insights into the Administration's thinking about developments in the South East Asian area generally with particular regard to refugees. Ian Soutar who was present at the hearing has provided the following summary account of the proceedings.
RESOLUTION ON REFUGEES
2. Before Holbrooke could present his testimony he had to sit through a discussion of the draft resolution, calling upon the President to urge the UN Secretary General to convene an emergency session of the General Assembly to discuss the refugee problem in South East Asia which was tabled by the sub-committee Chairman Lester Wolff. (There is something of a jurisdictional dispute between Wolff's sub-committee, and the Refugee and Immigration sub-committee of the House Judiciary Committee and
Wolff never loses an opportunity to promote himself and his activities on behalf of the refugee cause). The hearing was organized as a media event, the Conference room being decorated with material from a recent exhibition of the boat people organized by members of the Vietnamese community here, and both Wolff and Holbrooke posing for the cameras in front of this. During the brief discussion of the draft resolution, all the members present expressed concern about the refugee exodus, calling it the worst humanitarian disaster since World War II. only dissenting note was struck by Congressman Diggs, who pointed out that, grave as the plight of the Indo-Chinese refugees was, there were many more refugees in Africa. However Congressman Solarz (the Chairman of the African sub-committee) and Wolff argued strongly that there was an essential difference between the two categories of
The
/refugees