TNAG-1185-FCO40-1487-Resettlement-of-Vietnamese-refugees-from-Hong-Kong-into-the--1982 — Page 140

of settlement from reception, and the refugee agencies have been left to care for the unaccompanied young children. The main source of these children has,

however, not been the quotas but those whom the Government has admitted following their rescue at sea by British registered ships. We recognise that unaccompanied refugee children represent an international problem and that it was right that the U.K. should make its contribution to their settlement. It would have been helpful, however, and to the long term benefit of the children, if they could have been identified in the country of first asylum so that a considered decision could be taken whether settlement in the U.K. rather than in some other country where they had relatives was the best option; and, if it was thought right to take them to this country, so that early decisions could be taken about how to provide the care they needed.

34. Special arrangements had to be made for the unaccompanied minors. For the sake of any future programme we think it worth explaining what was done for the Vietnamese, the underlying considerations, and what remains to be done. From the beginning, the policy of the agencies has been to seek to unite these children with other relatives or to press for visas for their parents. During the course of the programme a significant number were settled with members of their families by one means or another. Nevertheless, at the beginning of 1981, it was clear that for some 40 children gathered together by Save the Children Fund from their reception centres and those operated by the British Refugee Council, special provision would be required. Similarly, Ockenden Venture identified this need for children who had been collected from their reception centros. In determining what this provision should be, the agencies were mindful of the traumatic experiences the children had already undergone. They had been separated from their parents, and under- taken a dangerous flight by sea, involving personal tragedy for many of them. After a period in a reception centre in this country, there had again been separation, this time from the group with whom they had travelled. The only security remaining for them, therefore, lay in their Vietnamese culture and way of life, and it was clear that this had to be safeguarded as far as possible. Since the majority of the children had parents who were still in Vietnam, with whom eventually they ought to be reunited, it was also important for the success of this reunion to ensure that they retained their own culture and language.

35. Adoption or fostering of the children by other Vietnamese while not discounted was not generally favoured. It was thought that the provision which the Vietnamese would make for an adopted child, outside their concept of the extended family, would not match that expected in this country. As regards the indigenous community it was the experience of Ockenden Venture, with 30 years' involvement in receiving and caring for displaced and refugee children, that, placed in isolation in families with whom there was no language communication, no shared culture nor continuity of relationship with others. who had had similar experience, children could repress their memories and later produce symptoms of disturbance leading to a breakdown of fostering. These children were already likely to be very disturbed; the result of failed fostering arrangements would be to leave them even more disturbed. This experience, from which Ockenden have contributed to international debate on unaccompanied minors, has been recognised by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, whose recommended policy recognises that the children benefit from being cared for with others of their own age and ethnic group so that stable relationships within their own culture can be maintained.

8.