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You will recall at the October meeting that the previous
High Commissioner spoke of the special problems of Vietnamese refugees. Hong Kong continues to have the largest number of boat people awaiting resettlement of any country of first asylum in South-East Asia. There are just over 9,500, two-thirds of
whom have been there for more than three years.
Last autumn the British Government announced that the UK would accept for resettlement several hundred Vietnamese refugees who have relatives in the UK but who would not have qualified for admission under our normal family reunion criteria. Most of these will come from camps in Hong Kong and the remainder from camps elsewhere in South-East Asia. The British Government are prepared to consider accepting, in addition to the family reunion cases, further limited numbers of Vietnamese refugees from Hong Kong. A decision on this will be taken in the light of the willingness shown by other countries to respond to Hong Kong's needs and of all the circumstances at the time.
The British Government has urged other countries to assist in the resettlement process by allocating more places to Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong. We are also grateful for UNHCR's appeal announced at the resettlement meeting held on 21 January for all governments to make a special effort to assist Hong Kong. We are most grateful indeed to the countries who have announced increases in their allocation of resettlement places for Hong Kong refugees and we very much hope that others
will be able to do so too.
Finally, Mr Chairman, I should like to thank Mr Hocke for his thoughtful and constructive speech and to assure him of Britain's determination to give him our full backing.
As a staunch supporter of the UNHCR the United Kingdom has pledged £3.5 million in cash and £2.8 million in food aid to the General Budget at the November pledging conference in New York. The United Kingdom has also responded quickly to the appeal for contributions for the Special Emergency Programme for Africa for the first three months of 1986. The UK will, as in the past, do its best to respond quickly and generously to special appeals.