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position to come out here and announce decisions. I was here, coming here, to form my impressions and then we can go back and talk about it.
MR BONAVIA:
(The Times) As a member of the British
6 Government, have you knowledge of any indication from the Vietnamese
Government that it would be prepared to co-operate in the repatriation of Vietnamese refugees to Vietnam bearing in mind that the vast majority of such repatriation would have to be forcible ?
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MINISTER: I have no such knowledge, no. I think we have just got to a stage when we ought to be discussing what ought
to be the long term aim. Just a minute ! We are not talking,
remember, about repatriating those who are in the camps here, we are looking a little further ahead and we are asking ourselves, well, has the pattern changed, is it really true that those who are now
arriving can be more correctly described as "economic migrants" rather than refugees in the true sense. If one comes to the conclusion that that is true, then the next question is, well, is it really right to pursue a policy which might well result in more
and more people leaving Vietnam to better their livelihood just as quickly as we try and settle in Western countries those who are
in the camps now. So the way I look at it is, we ought to be considering who might best make an approach to Vietnam, we ought to
be considering whether perhaps the governments who are at the
present time taking in refugees should consider together how a 27 joint approach might best be made and I can't help feeling, knowing 28 how difficult my job is in Britain, that public opinion certainly
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in Britain would not be content to see people returned to Vietnam
having fled here, unless some independent organisation of real
prestige was preapred to stand up and say, well, conditions have
changed and the time has arrived when it is possible now to change
course. Now, that is a big step too. I am not sure that we have
got anywhere near that stage yet, when for instance the UNHCR would 35 say, in the event of the Western governments agreeing on the policy 36
of repatriation, yes, we think this is right, conditions in Vietnam
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