AUSTRALIAN REFUGEE AND SPECIAL HUMANITARIAN
PROGRAM
1983/84
The 1983/84 Program announced by Minister for Immigration and
Ethnic Affairs Stewart West in the Australian Parliament on 18 May represents a positive reaffirmation of Australia's commitment to humanitarian and international obligations in
the resolution of global refugee situations. It provides a flexibility to meet unforeseen humanitarian situations, seeks
to achieve a better geographic spread of refugee resettlement places, and, through the maintenance of a high resettlement capacity, will seek to encourage refugee source and resettlement
countries to meet their international burden-sharing responsi-
bilities.
The Government's planning figures for 1983/84 are:
(A) Refugees:
Indochinese
East European
Latin (including central) America
Other (global with emphasis on
10,000
2,500
750
the Middle East)
1,750
Contingency reserve
2,000
(B) Special humanitarian program
3,000
Total ceiling
20,000
A ceiling of 16,000 fare paid places for the 1983/84 refugee
and humanitarian program (15,000 and 1,000 respectively) has
been approved, to be administered within an agreed budgetary
limit.
Points to note in connection with the program are:
•
The Government has established generous ceiling figures for
the refugee and humanitarian programs which compare most
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