TNAG-1392-FCO40-1864-Future-of-Hong-Kong-briefing-for-meetings-and-visits-1985 — Page 216

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A

have however indicated that this idea remains Douglas'

it is not official US Government policy.

B.

Options designed to increase the rate of departures

25. (a) Voluntary repatriation to Vietnam

be

own, and that

desirable

the most

Not suprisingly, there

UNHCR consider voluntary repatriation to

solution to refugee problems. We agree.

have been few

few volunteers for repatriation to Vietnam. Of the 20 who

have SO far applied from Hong Kong, 14 have returned to Vietnam; the

other six applications are still pending.

In response to an

approach from Mr Hartling in September 1984, the Vietnamese said

that there was no reason why Vietnam should take back Vietnamese who

did not wish to participate in the work of reconstruction and who

left Vietnam, although they were prepared to

consider applications

on a case-by-case basis. This augurs badly for any large scale

repatriation to Vietnam; and there are not in any case likely

many more volunteers.

(b) Local absorption

UNHCR also favour

Kong has absorbed

Vietnam, since 1975.

is

to be

Hong

settlement in the country of first asylum.

14,500 displaced Indo-Chinese, mostly from

Hong Kong's relative wealth might be cited as

a reason to take a greater number

number of Vietnamese. But the territory

already densely populated; it has had to deal with enormous

immigration from China in the same period and Chinese legal immigrants still number over 27,000 a year. The people of Hong Kong

would be unlikely to welcome Vietname se immigration while illegal

immigrants from China are being repatriated daily. There is always

the danger that further absorption by Hong Kong would trigger more

departures from Vietnam. Nevertheless, if the flow of

arrivals can be slowed and an adequate way found to deal with future

arrivals, it would be reasonable to expect Hong Kong to absorb a

proportion of those in centres, as part of a general programme of

resettlement or repatriation for the remainder. But the Hong Kong

Government would only consider this on the strict understanding that

it was a once and for all gesture, which would need to be linked to

international effort, with UK participation, to deal with what would then be a fixed number of refugees in Hong Kong.

an

Vietnamese

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