TNAG-0877-FCO40-1087-Refugees-from-Vietnam-in-Hong-Kong-Vietnamese-boat-people-1979 — Page 115

2 January 1979

CONFIDENTIAL

QUADRIPARTITE MEETING, GUADELOUPE

5-6 January 1979

REFUGEES FROM VIETNAM

Brief by Foreign and Commonwealth Office

SUMMARY OF ESSENTIAL FACTS AND POINTS TO MAKE

1. Refugees from Vietnam have been fleeing the country in increasing numbers since 1975. Up to recently most got away on small craft, many losing their lives in the process, but a new feature is the large scale exodus, mostly of ethnic Chinese who are being singled out for victimisation under the Government's internal policy. The Vietnamese Government is controlling the operation, working through unscrupulous Chinese middlemen in the region, to arrange for the departure of refugees in exchange for payment in gold as a means of acquiring a considerable increment in the State's financial

reserves. Three merchant vessels, each laden with several thousand refugees, have already arrived at various ports in South East Asia and others are likely to be on the way. These have posed problems particularly for Hong Kong and Malaysia which are already overcrowded with refugees.

2. The United Kingdom has a dual interest in the problem :-

(a) as a country willing to admit more refugees for resettlement; and

(b) through our specific responsibility for

Hong Kong as a British Dependent Territory.

The "Huey Fong", a Taiwanese owned cargo vessel, has been anchored just outside Hong Kong's territorial waters since 23 December with 2,700 refugees aboard. The ship diverted

/to Hong Kong

CONFIDENTIAL