37,000 Iraqi Kurds in camps who were being dealt with separately. On them, discussions are continuing: some 3,000 may want to go to third countries but there are no firm proposals on resettlement yet. Turkey seems to be making more effort to stop irregular departures. The co-operation there has been is important to continuing efforts to persuade the Turks to drop their geographical limitation on the Convention.
5. The Nordic countries, Canada and the Netherlands indicated that they were in principle prepared to make a similar commitment to last year and were flexible about the inclusion of Iraqis. Other countries had like us told the Turks that discussion of assistance for the camp Iraqis should be multilateral, involving UNHCR. I did not give a figure but expressed a willingness to consider any cases, Iranian or Iraqi, for whom the UK seemed the most appropriate country of resettlement. UNHCR were pleased with this response and will continue to work on the same basis. A table showing acceptances and departures in 1988 is at Annex.
EASTERN EUROPE
6.
Mr Arnaout reported on a UNHCR mission to Hungary earlier this month. Hungary has officially received over 13,000 asylum seekers from Romania and unofficially the total could be 25,000. Romanian exit controls have now virtually halted legal arrivals but a trickle of illegal continues. Most are ethnic Hungarians and will be able to stay in Hungary; a proportion are German and will have their option of going to Germany. There may be a need to settle a small proportion of ethnic Romanians. In discussions UNHCR had stressed to Hungary the importance of joining the club: signing up to the Convention, no refoulement, controlling irregular movements. The international community was then likely to look favourably on proposals for assistance. The Hungarians had been very receptive and seemed to be moving towards accession to the Convention in the near future. (It is perhaps worth noting that the Austrian delegation were privately infuriated by Mr Arnaout appearing to take all the credit for this. The UNHCR
mission had apparently been preceded by a number of trilateral meetings in Vienna arranged by the Austrians.)