16
HICO
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
London SW1A 2AH
From The Minister of State
The Hon Francis Maude MP
Mike Morris Esq Secretary for Social and Foreign Affairs Evangelical Alliance Whitefield House
186 Kennington Park Road London SE11 4BT
8 March 1990
HKB
243
RECEIVED IN 250
115
RY
все
Dea de
منعه سال
22 MAR 1990
DESK OFICER
INDEX
MA
ля GF. OC. Me Hamilton,
SEAD
写
I am sorry I have not replied earlier to your letter of 25 January about Vietnamese unaccompanied minors in Hong Kong. Since we met on 13 December there have been a number of developments, and I am now able to bring you up to date on these.
You may recall that I explained to you the special arrangements under the Comprehensive Plan of Action for looking after unaccompanied children. These included the establishment of a Committee under the auspices of the UNHCR to find the best solution for each child on a case by case basis. This Committee has now been set up, and the UNHCR office in Hong Kong have appointed an executive agency to undertake the detailed casework.
Research has generally confirmed what I told you earlier: that the unaccompanied children in camps in Hong Kong tend to fall into two categories, namely those whose parents have already reached the West and those whose parents remained behind in Vietnam. In a very large number of cases, the children are in the care of uncles or aunts in a wider network of extended Vietnamese families. This makes it difficult to estimate the total number of unaccompanied children in Hong Kong, but we believe the Committee will be asked to consider something in the region of 5,000 cases.
Very few orphans have been identified. Those who have no parents tend to be absorbed into family groups, usually of relatives, and in such circumstances adoption is not
1