CONFIDENTIAL
TALKS WITH US OFFICIALS ON SOUTH EAST ASIAN REFUGEE PROBLEMS:
FCO, 2 NOVEMBER, 10 AM.
W(170)
Present
Mr A E Donald CMG
Assistant Under Secretary
Mr JD N Hartland-Swann, Head SEAD
Mr G Phillips,
Assistant Under Secretary, Home Office
Mr N Montgomery-Pott
Home Office Immigration
Mr R Hoare, IKD
Mr D Peate, UND
Mr Robert Funseth, Senior Deputy Assistant Secretary for Refugee Programmes, US State Department
Mr R Paiva,
US Mission, Geneva
Miss E Sutter, US Embassy London
Mr C M J Segar, SEAD
1. After welcoming remarks from Mr Donald, who then left the meeting,
Mr Hartland-Swann suggested that Mr Funseth open the discussion.
He
began with a description of the administrative organisation in Washington for the management of refugee issues. Ambassador Douglas
was the President's Special Assistant for Refugee Affairs and had an
office in the State Department. Under the 1980 Refugee Act he also had an interdepartmental mandate (covering Justice, Immigration and Health) but ran his own budget and reached his own decision on refugee numbers. The 98-man section in the State Department handled one third of the State Department's budget (nearly $350m). Two
thirds of this went on refugee assistance and one third for resettle-
ment.
2. Turning to South East Asia, Mr Funseth pointed out that it was still a major political and humanitarian problem. The four major
resettlement states were in increasing difficulties and faced problems
with ther legislature because it was not clear when the refugee
problem would end. The $2bn which was the total domestic cost of
refugees in the US was also becoming a political issue. Mr Funseth pointed out that refugees represented a very small proportion of total immigrants when compared to the continuing scale of illegal immigration but this distinction was not make by the American public or
CONFIDENTIAL
/their