ARTICLE BY FOREIGN MINISTER HANS BLIX PUBLISHED BY
"EXPRESSEN" ON 12 JULY 1979
135(A)
WE MUST PLACE DEMANDS ON VIETNAM
The question is being asked all over the world, what can be done to stem the flood of boat refugees and to help those who are now waiting" in camps under insufferable conditions. Some aid donors have declared their intention to stop their aid to Vietnam, a policy which also has its advocates in
Sweden.
Information about facts and motives is contradictory. It is clear, however, that the refugees from Vietnam can be counted in hundreds of thousands and that the overwhelming majority
of them are ethnic Chinese.
In some quarters it is believed that Vietnam wishes to rid herself of a minority regarded as unreliable and furthermore
to lessen the burden of supporting her population.
Apologists for Vietnam say that the emigration is illegal and that it costs the country trained labour and ships. It is also asserted that those affected are people who cannot adapt
themselves to the new socialist order in the country.
What is true and what can be done? The reasons for the mass
exodus are certainly numerous, but when many hundreds of thousands of people leave Vietnam in overloaded, dangerous boats without a fixed destination rather than remaining in this country we are faced with terrible evidence about their situation. It must also be a question of an exodus tolerated or enforced by the authorities.
We demand that every person shall live the right to leave his own country, und we often criticise the Bust bloc countries for not respecting this right. The fact that Vietnam allows emigration is a positive factor. But measures, the effects of which are that a minority group are driven out of their
/country
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