A/34/627 English Page 8
21. Following this meeting, a UNHCR mission, composed of senior officials, went to South-East Asia and, during the period from 29 July to 17 August, visited Hong Kong, Indonesia, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand. The main purpose of the mission was to help field offices organize resettlement on an increased scale and to discuss major aspects of the refugee problem in each country. Talks were held, at the highest levels, with authorities and embassies concerned, with organizations of the United Nations system, with voluntary agencies and with ICEM officials in an endeavour to ensure the most efficient action and the best possible co-ordination at the field level. Discussions focused on the principle of asylum, resettlement and matters such as living conditions in camps while awaiting resettlement, registration of refugees, transit centres for refugees whose departure is imminent and refugee processing centres for those accepted by resettlement countries, but having a low priority for actual movement.
22. Since that time, the High Commissioner has continued to monitor the situation closely. The increased number of resettlement opportunities available in July 1979 are being utilized through an accelerated rate of resettlement (18,161 refugees from the area were resettled in July, 20,536 in August and 25,495 in September). To that effect, registration of refugees and preparation of individual resettlement dossiers has been intensified. Active co-operation with an increasing number of selection missions, which have visited the regions from various countries, has been taking place in each country of temporary asylum. While the average monthly rate of departures during the first half of 1979 was 8,897, it increased to 21,400 during the third quarter of the year. Efforts continue to obtain additional offers of resettlement (the High Commissioner has been notified of some 13,500 since the July Meeting), as well as to maintain the impetus in processing and in the rate of departures. New arrivals in the area, both land and boat cases, amounted to 25,750 in July, 9,846 in August and 14,282 by the end of September. A total of 206,678 had arrived during the first half of 1979, that is, a monthly average of 34,446. As at 30 September, the total number of Indo-Chinese refugees and displaced persons in South-East Asia was 342,998, primarily in ASEAN countries and Hong Kong, and consisted of 181,184 "boat people" and 161,814 who arrived in Thailand by land.
23. New resettlement offers from the international community have increased the total to 273,500 for the one-year perind extending from July 1979 to June 1980. UNHCR has endeavoured to reach a target of approximately 25,000 departures per month (attained in September 1979) in an effort to utilize over a 12-month period the total reserve of 273,500 resettlement offers.
A. Refugee processing centres
24. The idea of a refugee processing centre first came up during the Consultative Meeting with Interested Governments on Refugees and Displaced Persons in South-East Asia, held at Geneva on 11 and 12 December 1978. Among the various closely related matters discussed and considered urgent was a proposal whereby special centres would be established where refugees and displaced persons could be processed for resettlement in an orderly way within a specific time scale, and against guarantees that there would be no residual problem. It was felt that this proposal should be
/...
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.