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CONFIDENTIAL
Can
Full
AUSTRALIA
no please
AUSTRALIAN CONSULATE GENERAL
HONG XUNG
21 June 1988
Mix Statie IPA
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зости. resettenet
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Dear Mr. Barnes,
Further to my letter of 15 June,
advising you of the Australian Government's reaction to the Hong Kong Government's changes to procedures for handling Vietnamese arrivals,
I thought you might like to have also the following text of a cable I have received reporting a
discussion with the British Deputy High Commissioner, Mr Dougal, on the same subject. The extract sets out the reaction of officials to Mr Dougal's
presentation:
HKD 243/7
"In thanking Dougal for his presentation and advice, Brown noted that we were aware of the possibility of the policy change in view of the close interest that our post in Hong Kong took on the issue. We said that Australia
Was sympathetic to the policy change and understood the need to deter the continuing flow of arrivals who were seeking enhanced economic opportunity
Hong Kong's response appeared to have elements in common with the policies introduced earlier in the year by Thailand and Malaysia to deter Indochinese arrivals
which we support, provided that mechanisms remained to identify and provide asylum to genuine refugees.
Australia continued to discuss with Vietnam the range of issues arising from the continuing outflow and the Vietnamese were aware of Australia's view that as the major source country, the SRV had a significant role to play in reducing the outflow.
while recognising that Vietnam has
not been forthcoming on the repatriation issue.
recognised the continuing resettlement problem that Hong Kong faces but that in view of our strong record of off-take and competing priorities among resettlement case-loads there was not likely to be an increase in our future rate of from Hong Kong.
CONFIDENTIAL
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ff-take
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