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From: PS
To: PS/No 10
JOINT US SENATE/CONGRESSIONAL DELEGATION TO THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BRITISH AMERICAN PARLIAMENTARY GROUP (BAPG)
The Prime Minister will receive Speaker Foley, Senator Byrd and other members of the US Delegation for half an hour at 16.45 on Tuesday 2 July. They will be accompanied by the US Ambassador, Mr Ray Seitz, and by Mr Michael Jopling MP. I enclose a delegation list, notes on Speaker Foley and Senator Byrd and a copy of their programme. I also enclose telegrams describing the US domestic political scene and US foreign policy concerns.
There is unlikely to be one single focus to the interests of the Joint Delegation but they will want to hear the Prime Minister's views on the European Council and on European attitudes to trade.
The visit provides an excellent opportunity to put across our views on those issues where attitudes on Capitol Hill can be decisive. The delegation will have seen the Foreign Secretary at a meeting and over a working lunch on 1 July, when he will have urged their support for our policies on Vietnamese migrants, Most Favoured Nation status for China and sanctions against South Africa. While there will be no need for the Prime Minister to go into detail on these, there would be value in him underlining the importance we attach to their satisfactory resolution and inviting questions. He might take this opportunity to press his views, in particular, on sporting links with South Africa.
In taking questions the Prime Minister may like to draw on the following:
VIETNAMESE MIGRANTS
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President Bush seems to have been swayed by the Prime Minister's recent approach (FCO telno 904 of 17 May). talks in Washington on 3/4 June between US/UK/Hong Kong Government officials, the Americans finally agreed to our pursuing the idea of Internationally Managed Centre(s) (IMC) in Vietnam for non-volunteer non-refugees. The key American concern is juridiction. They want to be able to argue that the involuntary transfer of non-refugees to an IMC is not repatriation to Vietnam but to territory outside Vietnam's control. This enables them to say that their policy has no changed.
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