TNAG-1417-FCO40-1900-Hong-Kong-Parliamentary-Sub-Committee-on-Race-Relations-and--1985 — Page 11

THE HOME AFFAIRS SUB-COMMITTEE ON RACE RELATIONS AND IMMIGRATION 121

4 February 1985]

[Continued

Vietnamese families as to refugees from other countries. In practice, we now admit only the spouse and minor children of a Vietnamese refugee already here, although applications for reunion from other relatives are studied on a case-by-case basis, and these may be granted if the circumstances are wholly exceptional. Over 3,800 Vietnamese have been resettled in the UK under family reunion arrangements.

Orderly Departure Programme

10. In 1979, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees negotiated with the Vietnamese Government a system of selective emigration from Vietnam, known as the Orderly Departure Programme (ODP) (see chart VII). To date some 65,000 Vietnamese have left Vietnam under this scheme, which it is hoped will provide an alternative to irregular departures by boat. The UK has settled around 2,000 Vietnamese under this programme, and over 2,000 more have been promised entry. In 1983 the number of Vietnamese leaving by boat continued to fall, to around 30,000 (against some 42,000 in 1982); some 19,000 left under the ODP, and the Vietnamese Government have indicated that they will issue 24,000 ODP exit permits in 1984. We have provided the UNHCR with financial support for the ODP (a total of £200,000 since 1982).

Piracy

11. In response to domestic and international concern, the UK has also contributed to an international effort aimed at curbing piracy against Vietnamese boat refugees, although this programme carries no resettlement obligations. Since 1982 we have contributed a total of £260,000 to a fund set up under the auspices of the UNHCR to support operations by the Thai Navy to combat attacks by pirates in the Gulf of Thailand. Although these attacks have continued, their frequency has dropped: around 50 per cent of refugee boats arriving in Thailand are now reporting attacks; two years ago this was 75 per cent. We are working with the Royal Thai Government, the 11 other donor nations and the UNHCR to achieve further improvements.

Durable solutions

12. But the humanitarian problem and the need for durable solutions both remain. We have to deal with a large residue of Indo-Chinese refugees (some 160,000 at the end of June 1984) in the camps in South East Asia and Hong Kong. But we must also seek to deter further exoduses by persuading the governments of Indo-China to improve their domestic policies and by developing alternatives to resettlement, which tends to act as a magnet to potential refugees. Our concern centres naturally on Hong Kong, which carries the largest load anywhere of unresettled Vietnamese refugees (some 12,800). The ways in which Hong Kong's refugee problem might be tackled are explored in parts IB and II below. But we are also keenly aware of the predicament confronting the other first asylum countries in the region, particularly those of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) (see chart I). Given its land borders with Indo-China, Thailand was borne the heaviest burden: over 127,000 Indo-Chinese await resettlement in Thai camps, the largest groups being Lao and Khmer. However, given our primary responsibility for Hong Kong and the difficulties we have experienced to date in resettling Indo-Chinese in the UK, we are unlikely to be able to contribute to resettlement from these countries, except on a case-by-case basis where applicants meet our family reunion criteria.

13. Meanwhile the UNHCR regards resettlement in western countries such as the UK as the least desirable long-term solution. We recognise in the light of experience that to transfer refugees with their own strong cultural tradition to unfamiliar and remote industrialised countries does not always provide a satisfactory answer. It is right to try to create the conditions in which refugees will want to return to their countries of origin of their own free will. This implies long term regional political solutions. Arguably resettlement may even undermine such impetus as exists in this direction.

14. Against this background the UK is working with the UNHCR and other interested countries to find viable alternatives to resettlement (see part IB) both as a general policy for