TNAG-0893-FCO40-1103-Refugees-from-Vietnam-in-Hong-Kong-Vietnamese-boat-people-1979 — Page 227

7

Foreign and Commonwealth Office London SW1A 2AH

UNCLASSIFIED

SF Howarth Esq

WASHINGTON

Telephone 01-

233 8631

Hkk 243/1

no 267

по

Your reference

Our reference

1269

Mr William

243/1

Date 3 July 1979

REFUGEES AND IMMIGRATION TO THE UK

1. I am sorry not to have replied sooner to the request in Ian Soutar's letter of 21 May for some statistical data about immigration to the UK and of the Government's assistance to the UNHCR.

2. On immigration to the UK, I enclose a copy of a self-explanatory Letter which I have just received from the Home Office. With regard to assistance for the UNHCR and other organisations working for the relief of refugees, I enclose a schedule of UK contributions made or pledged for this purpose during 1978 and so far this year. I hope all this will be of some assistance to you in your discussions with the Americans.

3.

More generally, and looking back a little further, you may be interested to know that there are estimated to be some 153, 000 people in the United Kingdom who enjoy asylum. That is, about 0.25 per cent of the total population: this is an estimate because no statistics are kept. Approximate totals have, however, been kept with regard to some special exercises which have been undertaken over the years.

For example, in 1956 22,000 Hungarians were admitted to the UK. In 1968 2,000 Czechs were admitted. Between 1972 and 1973 we accepted just under 30,000 Ugandan Asians and from 1973 until now we have admitted some 3,000 Latin Americans, primarily Chileans. Since 1975 we have also accepted 3,184 Indo-China refugees.

Also, since late 1974 about 10,000 Cypriot nationals have been admitted and, since the disturbances in The Lebanon, temporary shelter in the UK has been granted to between 2,000 and 3,000 people from that country. Apart from these special exercises there is a regular annual inflow of refugees from various parts of the world, usually some 37988 or so a year.

300

CC (+ encs):

I C Orr, Gvt Secretariat AHONG KONG

P Morgan

United Nations Department

/SEAD