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CONFIDENTIAL
ANGLO-GERMAN SUMMIT: 27 NOVEMBER 1985
SECRETARY OF STATE'S MEETING WITH HERR GENSCHER
VIETNAMESE REFUGEES IN HONG KONG
Essential Facts
General
1.
10,000 Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong awaiting
resettlement: the largest number of any place of first asylum
in South East Asia.
The refugees are spending increasingly long periods in Hong Kong because of diminishing resettlement prospects: 60% have been there over 3 years.
Report of Home Affairs Sub-Committee on Race Relations and Immigration (SCORRI)
2. A Home Office White Paper in response to SCORRI's report
on "Refugees and Asylum with Special- Reference to the Vietnamese" was published on 26 September.
It announced inter
alia:
500
(i) HMG's decision to accept for resettlement s ome
refugees, mostly from Hong Kong, who have relatives in the UK but who would normally
normally fall
fall outside the Home Office's
immigration criteria for family reunion cases;
(ii) that, depending on the willingness shown by other resettlement countries to respond to Hong Kong's needs,
HMG are prepared to consider accepting further limited numbers from Hong Kong. The Hong Kong Government would similarly be prepared to absorb limited numbers into Hong Kong from the camps, but again this will depend on other countries' response to the UK's initiative.
CONFIDENTIAL