Ми поздной 7/8. Whent to file?
пут
5/8
1 HMD 345/2fam?
RECEIVER IN
2 August 1993
J Sweet Esq B6 Division IND
Home Office
Lunar House
O 5 AUG 1993
DESK OF
INDE
General visu -345/2
OSTRY
Robiny $
s for Hidast Foreign &
b A ka
b3
Commonwealth
Office
London SWIA 2AH
Telephone: 071-
(13)
لا
20=
ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION FROM PRC VIA HONG KONG.
1. Under cover of your letter of 27 May, you sent us an extract from the record of the May Ad Hoc meeting about the significant increase in the number of migrants coming to Europe from China. You will recall that a number of delegations believed that one source of these movements was Hong Kong, and we agreed to put this to the authorities in Hong Kong. They have replied as follows:
"The suggestion that illegal immigrants from China use Hong Kong as a springboard into Europe would only have relevance if such illegal immigrants carried forged BDTC/BN (0) passports. But such cases are very rare.
Many mainland Chinese travelling to other countries do transit through Hong Kong (100,000 last year). However, Hong Kong has a well deserved reputation in the region for tough and efficient immigration controls which act as a deterrent to would-be illegal immigrants. Hong Kong has also recently reinforced controls on persons in direct transit who remain airside, to ensure that the Territory is not used as a transit point for illegal immigrants.
It is our understanding that illegal immigrants from China bound for Europe prefer to travel overland through Russia. would appear to be the lack of controls on that route which are the cause of the current problems."
It
It is of course always difficult to try to prove a negative, and although any system is open to abuse, we have no reason to doubt Hong Kong's assertion that they take seriously the question of immigration control. More recently you will have seen WGI 1548 about the problem of asylum seekers of Chinese origin; although there were several references to Hong Kong in this paper, the Territory was not singled out for special criticism, nor were there any allegations of forged Hong Kong papers having been used. In case you had not seen it previously, I enclose also a copy of David Campbell's letter of 27 July on Chinese immigrants.
། ོ་
R W Sindon
Migration and Visa Department
* W/2
ले