TNAG-1427-FCO40-1910-Vietnamese-refugees-in-Hong-Kong-general-1986 — Page 231

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IN REGISTRY

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3 ANIL 1985

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Vietnamese Refugees in Hong Kong:

SCORRI Report and Future Policy

1. Thank you for your minute of 15 July. I am glad that you are prepared to accept the SCORRI recommendation on the family reunion cases. I see that as an essential first step.

2. I do not underestimate the difficulties in doing more and I am conscious of the problems you face over the Tamils and the Strasbourg decision. But I was nevertheless very disappointed that you felt unable to go beyond the SCORRI recommendation on the question of the admission of Vietnamese here. In my view what you propose will not be sufficient to avert the real and serious dangers which were foreseen in the paper enclosed with my minute of 20 May. The longer we leave this problem the less easy it will be to interest other countries in helping us to solve it: I believe we could well face a crisis in the camps within the lifetime of this government and find ourselves having to take even more far- reaching steps to solve it than are now proposed.

3. It is correct that United States and Australian attitudes to resettlement appear to be hardening (the only honourable exception to this is Canada). But it is resettlement from Hong Kong which is being hit hardest, and I am convinced that the primary reason for this is our own failure in recent years to do anything serious ourselves to help with the resettlement of Vietnamese from Hong Kong. Our performance this year is behind even such countries as Norway, France, West Germany, Japan and New Zealand, let alone the United States, Canada and Australia.

4. I fear that acceptance of the family reunion cases on its own will not do much to persuade other countries to help. They think

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