Mr. Chairman,
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REFUCCES
Cammon
STATEMENT
As
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I now wish to turn to a major aspect of the UNHCR's work
which has received close international attention over the past year
and which is the subject of the Secretary-General's report (A/34/627)
presented yesterday by Mr. Waldheim. This is the question of
Vietnamese, Kampuchean and Laotian refugees and displaced persons
in South-East Asia. The general views which I express here are those
of the European Community and its nine Member States. These views
have been supplemented by our individual delegations in interventions
in the course of this debate.,
Firstly, I wish to recall that the Minister for Foreign Affairs
of Ireland, speaking on behalf of the European Community and its
ninę Member States at the International Meeting on South-East
Asia in Geneva in July last, set out certain basic principles which
we believe should be respected in these questions. These principles
encompass respect for human rights, including the right to asylum
and non-refoulement.
As the report of the High Commissioner (A/34/12) and the
report of the Secretary-General (A/34/627) both point out, the
problem of refugees in South-East Asia is not a new one. For a
number of years past there has been a considerable and constant flow
of people out of the Indo-China region. Within the past year,
however, this movement has reached extraordinary proportions
and has become a matter for alarm not only
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