Registry No.
SECURITY CLASSIFICATION
Top Secret.
Secret.
Confidential.
Restricted. Unclassified.
PRIVACY MARKING
In Confidence
445
事
DRAFT
Telegram
To:-
EXODUS FROM VIETNAM
1.
Type I +
FROM
Telephone No. Ext.
Department
The British Government announced on 28 May that on
humanitarian grounds Britain would accept the Vietnamese
refugees rescued at sea by the "Sibonga".
The statement
stressed that the Government could not make a general
commitment about similar action in future and added that
consultations would be pursued urgently with the Hong Kong Government and the international community about the
settlement of Indochinese refugees.
2. On 29 May a Foreign Office statement appealed to the
authorities in Taiwan to accept refugees.
The Lord Privy Seal
to certain posts)
in a speech on 30 May (Retract
described the Vietnamese policy towards "boat people
By
NOTHING TO BE WRITTEN IN THIS MARGIN
predominantly "Vietnamese citizens of Chinese descent"
as "blatantly racialist".
LINE TO TAKE (Guidance on policy will follow).
3. The British Government deplores the deliberate and callous policy of the Vietnamese authorities in deporting these
encouraging this exodus
unfortunate people. Police interviews with refugees arriving in Hong Kong confirm earlier reports that ethnic Chinese
sometimes after several generations of family residence in
Vietnam are being subjected to a policy of pressure and
intimidation to leave. Their evidence refutes Vietnamese
Government denials that they oOMİY
en organise,
thes emigrati kann,
the hypnonimy or
Vietnamonti
offers 157
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