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Q. What is your personal view on that, do you prefer MTR?
A. I am waiting for this crumpled document.
Q. Have you any reason to believe there is going to be an increasingly
significant number of refugees over the next few months?
GAT BAN
A. I don't think so. It's quite true that departures from Vietnam
this year have increased and the figures for May I think are something
like 10,000 arriving from Vietnam in various parts of SE Asia
700 arrived here -- but that compares with 2,500 or 3,000 in January.
I think the reason is purely climatic. This is not in any way
comparable with the movement last year which resulted in a direct act
of policy by the Vietnamese Government to exclude the Chinese population
from the ordinary life of that community. It is a movement of ethnic
Vietnamese who escape and I have no reason at the moment to doubt
the good faith of the Vietnamese government. It is a very long
coastline and it would be difficult to stop numbers of this sort
getting away. I imagine that when the NE monsoon comes back again
movement won't be so attractive and the numbers will drop away.
Q. Do you think that the moratorium is being enforced less vigourously by
the Vietnamese government?
A. No. I think the reason is climatic.
Q. How much is the position complicated by the difficulties of drawing a distinction
between illegal immigrants and refugees and people who left Vietnam?
A. This is a matter for the UN High Commissioner. He accepts that they are
all refugees.
Q. What about the Hong Kong Government?
A. So long as he accords them refugee status, we will accept them here
temprarily, pending resettlement elsewhere.
Q. Can you tell us what are the main points you are going to do whilst
in office?
A. It's getting on a bit and this would take a long time. The main thing
at the top of my list is to review all major programmes which we are engaged in and whose details have been set out in White Papers and in
programme plans to review the extent their adequacy is affected by the
increased population. While we are acutely conscious that they must be affected, I'm afraid it's high time we faced up to what effect on the future what has happened at any rate in the past has had.
has not yet been done.
Q
How do you
This