TNAG-0900-FCO40-1110-Refugees-from-Vietnam-in-Hong-Kong-Vietnamese-boat-people-1979 — Page 38

AKK 243|1

RECEIVED IN REGISTRY NO. 51

BAR1980

DESK

INDEX

REGISTRY Action Taken

Awill

BRITISH EMBASSY

LUXEMBOURG

20 December 1979

FA 243/

3:CUCAZ

∙118A)

3516

a UND

HKGD WED

Gass

PA

I C Orr Esq

Government Secretariat

Lower Albert Road

HONG KONG

Dear Orr

RESETTLEMENT OF VIETNAMESE REFUGEES

211

Awal

Bulo

1942

1. I apologise for the delay in replying to your letter of 8 November to Clive Stitt about resettlement of Vietnamese refugees. I have only recently been able to contact the responsible desk officer in the Luxembourg Foreign Ministry, M. Conrad.

2. Luxembourg originally agreed to take 50 Vietnamese refugees. This figure did not represent a quota but was considered to be a realistic estimate of the number of refugees the country could absorb without undue difficulty. But, in fact, with the arrival of a further group of 17 refugees in December a total of 71 Vietnamese will have been resettled here this year.

3. Luxembourg has set no quota for resettlement of Vietnamese refugees for 1980. But the Foreign Ministry have told me that 130 visas for settlement in Luxembourg have been issued to Vietnamese by the Belgian Embassies in Manila and Hanoi which look after Luxembourg interests. All those with visas will be allowed to settle here if they wish to do so. Most of the visas have been issued to boat people who landed in the Philippines but 37 have been granted to refugees to come direct from Vietnam to rejoin members of their family already in Luxembourg.

4.

The Luxembourg Government works closely with the local representa- tive of the UNHCR over the selection of refugees. The usual procedure is that the HCR representative submits a list of names to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. After vetting, the Ministry sends instructions to the Belgian representative in Manila to issue settlement visas to those listed. The Ministry also authorises the issue of visas at the request of Vietnamese refugees already resident here who wish to be reunited with a family member still in Vietnam. But in such cases the Luxembourgers make it clear that they can give no assistance whatsoever to obtain a Vietnamese exit visa.

5. M. Conrad thought that there may already be some boat people from Hong Kong among the Vietnamese refugees already here and undertook to check and let me know. He saw no reason why Hong Kong boat people

RESTRICTED

/should