TNAG-0896-FCO40-1106-Refugees-from-Vietnam-in-Hong-Kong-Vietnamese-boat-people-1979 — Page 307

CONFIDENTIAL

British Embassy

3100 Massachusetts Avenue NW Washington DC 20008

Telex Domestic USA 89-2370/89-2384

Telex International 64224(WUI)/248308(RCA)/440015(ITT)

Telephone (202) 462-1340

DC Wilson Esq

Government Secretariat

HONG KONG

Your reference

Our reference

Mr Quant

Cetual PA

fors

HKK 243

Date

7 August, 1979

1533

My dem Drize,

VIETNAM REFUGEES

1.

M.

Мо

Many thanks for your letter of 6 July. delay in answering.

1/

I apologise for the

2. As far as the mechanics go, Vietnamese refugee allocation quotas are decided jointly by the State Department Office of Refugee and Migration Affairs and by Ambassador Clark. The recommendations are made at the level of Jere Broh-Kahn, in Ambassador Clark's office, Henry Cushing and Shepard Lowman, respectively Deputy Director and Director of the Refugee Office "on the basis of the humanitarian, political and operational considerations pre ailing at the time". The final decision rests with Ambassador Clark.

3. The picture with respect to criteria is murkier, and there is a certain studied ambiguity in what one hears. Some contacts emphasise that humanitarian considerations predominate, which is another way of saying that those refugees judged to be in the worst plight tend to get a prior claim, even if part of the reason for their plight is callous treatment by the authorities in the country of their first land-fall. The Americans would never admit this publicly of course, but where degrees of wretchedness are involved it is perhaps not altogether surprising (however "unfair") that less immediate thought is given to those refugees known to be safely in the hands of the Hong Kong Government.

4. Others underline the political importance that the Administra- tion attach to seeing ASEAN thrive as a viable political and economic concept in their wider map for stability in East Asia. This idea has been a commonplace in official statements of US policy for a long time. It follows that action calculated to reduce friction among ASEAN countries and to sustain their cohesion and good relations with the United States will have a high claim on American priorities. There is no countervailing political imperative in terms of US relations with Hong Kong or with HMG: it is the fate of the faithful to be taken for granted.

CONFIDENTIAL

15.