TNAG-1530-FCO40-2094-Hong-Kong-Vietnamese-refugees-general-1986 — Page 66

2.

N

7,900

8,500 density of population], Malaysia has 8,782 and about 10,000 are camps in Indonesia, the Philippines, Japan and Singapore. The British Government has renewed its diplomatic approaches, both bilaterallyand at multilateral meetings, to persuade other countries to ease Hong Kong's burden.

669,315

· pn /i

Hong Kong

carries the heaviest burden outside. Theil and and have particularly high proportion of /" long stayer" refugees, many from North Vietnam, have proved diblical t matter.

3. In the past decade, 58,069 refugees are known to have left Vietnam in boats and to have succeeded in reaching neighbouring

countries. Thousands more boat people must be assumed to have

International concern focussed on the boat people at perished.

L

Britain contributed £5m

and the offer

of resettle mamt places for

10,000 ido - ChánMA.

the height of their exodus in the late 1970s and, on Britain's initiative, a United Nations conference on Indochinese refugees was held in Geneva in July 1979. Its main achievment was to speed up the process of resettling refugees through the Office of the UNHCR, by eliciting increased offers of acceptance from resettlement countries and by raising international funds to support the resettlement programme. At

At the same time a strong plea was made by the UN Secretary-General (then Mr Waldheim) for a reduction in the disorderly exodus of thousands of people fleeing

political, religious and economic repression. The British Government has consistently stressed that the "root cause of the whole problem lies in Hanoi" and called upon the Vietnamese Government to face up to its responsibility for this. The negotiation of a system of legal emigration from Vietnam, known as the Orderly Departure Programme (ODP), between the UNHCR and the Vietnamese Government in May 1979, represented recognition to some extent of this responsibility. The scheme has provided a valuable (albeit fimited) alternative to illegal departures by boat. 1779

Britain

Vutnamus

provides

financial

ODP cases

for

support for resettlement.

the programme

113.592

hab

accepted

บ

визнаю

4. Since the inception of the ODP, 109678 Vietnamese have left their country direct by air for permanent resettlement elsewhere. In 1985 the number of departures (24,940) exceeded illegal departures by boat (22,258) but in 1986 this trend has been

Average reversed. Monthly ODP departures have fallen from an average e£

1,550 just over 2,000 in 1985 to

for the first &* months of this year; during this period, illegal boat departures have averaged 2012 a month.

ming.

J. People accepted for emigration under the ODP must have

/obtained

MEN