290
CODE 18-77
Mr Smith
HKGD
WH 312
CONFIDENTIAL
FA 243/15 (297
Reference
HKK243|1
VIETNAMESE REFUGEES
1.
When we spoke last week you said you had not yet received further Home Office comments on your draft inter-departmental paper on action for Hong Kong over refugees (Clift's letter of 16 November to Soden).
2. I am glad there is still time to register one or two points from here:-
a)
Perhaps we ought to be careful to avoid exploiting the statistics to overstate Hong Kong's case. It is still touch and go (though I believe Margolis in Hong Kong has a bet on it!) whether refugees on
31 December 1982 will exceed the total on 31 December 1981. Hong Kong's problem is not yet a net increase, but that
i)
the regional decline in total boat people arrivals was not reflected in the seasonal
(S W Monsoon) flow to Hong Kong in early summer when figures were just as high as last year. It is only for May August that Hong Kong received half the boat people arrivals. For 1982 as a whole the proportion is much lower; and it is misleading to quote a net rise from April September as a trend. However, resettlement figures are falling much faster since the US decided on a ceiling for S E Asia earlier this year. Priority is also being given to Thailand and ASEAN states (not only by the US but eg Australia as well). So next year if seasonal arrivals remain high and resettle- ments remain low, the increase could be substantial.
ii) Meanwhile the residue of unresettleable cases continues to grow; and unless we help too, it will be difficult to persuade others to shift them.
The opening paragraph might read as follows:-
1.
Hong Kong is increasingly concerned at the continued arrival of refugees at the rate of about 8,500 a year des- pite a recent fall in the numbers of boat people arriving in SE Asia as a whole, and at the continuing decline in resettlement opportunities in third countries who are likely again this year to reduce their total off-take by half. At nearly 13,000, Hong Kong has by far the largest Vietnamese refugee population in S E Asia and 40% of these have been awaiting resettlement for over two years. The Hong Kong government introudced in July a policy of confining newly arrived refugees in closed camps where they do not have the opportunity to work:
CONFIDENTIAL
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