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CONFIDENTIAL
during his visit to China in March. Deng Xiaoping accepted that the
steps taken on the Chinese side to deal with the problem had not
proved effective and said that more would be done. Since then there
has been a drop in the numbers of legal immigrants (to below 200 a
day in the last week or so), but the number of illegals has continued
to rise. Further discussions with the Chinese authorities are due
to take place in Hong Kong shortly. If the improvement in the
figures for legal immigration is not maintained one option would be
to impose immigration controls on the Hong Kong side. But this has
not been done since before the Cultural Revolution and would almost
certainly be resisted by the Chinese. It is possible that the
British garrison in Hong Kong may have to be reinforced to help deal
with illegal immigrants.
Refugees from Vietnam
4.
There are now some 24,000 Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong
awaiting resettlement elsewhere. More than 20,000 of these have
arrived since the beginning of this year; during the last month
new arrivals have been coming at a rate of between 600 and 800 a day.
There is a real prospect of 75,000 or more refugees from Vietnam in
Hong Kong by the end of the summer. Accommodation for numbers on
this scale will be very difficult indeed. The greater part of the
recent influx have arrived in small boats, but over 6,000 came on
two freighters, the HUEY FONG and the SKYLUCK. There is evidence
that these were part of a commercial traffic in refugees organised
for profit with the active encouragement of the Vietnamese
Government.
5.
We and the Hong Kong Government have done what we can to
discourage large scale trafficking in refugees. The HUEY FONG was
kept outside Hong Kong for four weeks before being allowed in and the
CONFIDENTIAL 3.
/2,600 refugees