CONFIDENTIAL
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166
Mr Gals
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M.
Vietnamese Refugees in Hong Kong:
Future Policy
The Secretary of State held a meeting this morning to consider policy on Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong, in the light of the Scorri report and of your submission of 18 April 2 and accompanying papers.
After a full discussion of the question of whether we should be willing to discuss with the Vietnamese Government the possibility of repatriating refugees to Vietnam, the Secretary of State concluded that this should not be pursued. The Secretary of State took the view that Parliamentary and public opinion in this country would not accept that we should discuss forcible repatriation with the Vietnamese regime given our condemnation of Vietnamese policies, not least in Cambodia.
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The Secretary of State accepted that if we were to have ne hope of persuading other countries to accept increased numbers from the camps in Hong Kong, we should ourselves have to accept a larger number in the UK. He agreed that we should seek to persuade the Home Office that we should offer to take the 400-500 family reunion cases, and also indicate a willingness to accept a further (perhaps undefined) rate of arrival in future years provided other countries did likewise. That might give us a degree of leverage over the resettlement policies of the other major western countries.
Grateful if you could let us have as soon as possible a draft minute from the Secretary of State to the Home Secretary embodying these conclusions. It would be worth pointing out to the Home Secretary that a policy of forcible repatriation would be all too likely to be compared with repatriation of Soviet prisoners at the end of the last War.
deelts
10 May 1985
cc:
PS/Mr Luce PS/PUS
Sir W Harding
Dr Wilson
Mr Hartland-Swann, SEAD Mr Lever, UND
(P F Ricketts)
HCK 24.3/5.
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