TNAG-0887-FCO40-1097-Refugees-from-Vietnam-in-Hong-Kong-Vietnamese-boat-people-1979 — Page 111

布政司署

CONFIDENTIAL

820

GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT

LOWER ALBERT ROAD

HONG KONG

香港下亞厘畢道

本署檔號 OUR REF.:

CR 3/4821/79

來函檔號 YOUR REF.:

Mr. R. J. T. McLaren

A

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

HKK 2431

RECEIVES #1665] Mr Hurray

1 JUN

24th May,

ky, 1979

30%

|

SEAD

Sanat

31/5

Hong Kong and General Department DESK OFFICER

NY

London SW1A 2AH

ENGLAND

RIDEX

PA

2

Eules

Dear lobin.

IIIGA

Accommodation: Vietnamese

Refugees

In our telephone discussion on the 23rd May when I briefed you on the very difficult accommodation position here for refugees you asked me to update the information in my letter CR 3/4821/79 of the 7th April to show how we were coping.

2.

Events of the last 7 weeks have shown only too clearly that our assessments have been almost wholly justified by the facts and that if anything we shall receive more refugees than we estimated in March.

3. We have attempted to maintain the arrangements by which refugees on arrival here become the responsibility of UNHCR as soon as possible. This has not been achieved in practice because:-

a)

b)

c)

The local UNHCR representative appears to be under instructions which results in a continuing under estimate of the actual demands for accommodation, Only today he told me that UNHCR were planning accommodation for 30,000 by the end of August: this is despite the fact that we already have 32,000 here of whom 9, 670 have come this month at an average arrival rate of 450 a day with departures of a paltry 462 so far in May.

UNHCR's processing arrangements only allow them to handle about 300 a day, but we have to transfer more than this as UNHCR accommodation becomes available. We are therefore transferring people to UNHCR faster than they are accepting them.

Because of the under estimating referred to in (a) above, I have had to find other accommodation to cope with refugees who would otherwise literally be floundering in the harbour as the unseaworthy vessels in which they arrive sink, In the se circumstances UNHCR grumble that they are not being consulted far enough in advance about potential accommodation commitments!

CONFIDENTIAL

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