CONFIDENTIAL
(c) More work needs to be done on fleshing out the idea of a
Holding Centre in Southern China, as advocated by
David Wilson. This leads on to the critical aspect of:
(d) Finance.
I have asked for the draft letter from yourself to the Chief Secretary of the Treasury to be brought forward urgently, and to include the various new proposals which raise questions of funding. As we all know only too well, the ODA provision for Disasters and Relief is already exhausted.
INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON INDO-CHINESE REFUGEES (ICIR)
4.
We then turned to our strategy for the run-up to the ICIR and for the actual conference in Geneva in June. I attach as background Robin McLaren's minute of 28 April covering a paper by SEAD on the broader issues and one by HKD on the specific issue of resettlement. You might wish to glance in particular
at paragraph 2 of the former with draft objectives for the ICIR, and paragraph 7 of the latter which gives interesting comparative figures to show what will be expected of us in respect of resettlement.
Mandatory Repatriation
5.
We discussed at length this horribly difficult question. The obstacles are intimidating: domestic Parliamentary, press and public misgivings; the reluctance of UNHCR; the peculiar hang-ups of the US (and of France); and the dangers of the Vietnamese concluding that they have a commodity for which others will be prepared to pay a high price. We clearly need to consider very carefully whether, when and how we should raise our public profile on this most sensitive of issues: we cannot afford to drive others away from the overall approach.
6.
That said, an ICIR which successfully tackles resettlement but does little, or not enough, on repatriation would be just about the worst outcome of all, creating a major new pull factor and fuelling fresh departures. Moreover, the principle of repatriation of the screened out to their country of origin is enshrined in the draft Comprehensive Plan of Action (CPA) and has been endorsed by all participants, including Vietnam. We must certainly therefore ensure that the ICIR at a minimum endorses the CPA, complete with the principle of mandatory repatriation. But we should try to go further, on the basis that the approach foreseen in the CPA is far too leisurely.
7.
We concluded that we should go for some fixed timetabling mechanism (as proposed in the SEAD paper, but as amended by the Governor), ie a review of progress on repatriation three months after the ICIR, with a deadline of four to six months after the ICIR for the start of phased repatriation. In
CONFIDENTIAL