CONFIDENTIAL
DRAFT
From: Foreign and Home Secretaries
To: Prime Minister
Manh
VIETNAMESE BOAT PEOPLE IN HONG KONG: RESETTLEMENT
1. The Private Secretary to the Foreign Secretary wrote to Mr.
Powell on 17 October about the outcome of the second round of
talks with the Vietnamese authorities on the return of Vietnamese
boat people in Hong Kong. We have taken the first important step towards achieving our objective of the return of all boat people who do not qualify to be treated as political refugees. We must now focus on those who do qualify. The beginning of the
repatriation exercise will reinforce the deterrent effect of our
new policies and reduce further the rate of illegal departures for Hong Kong. The latest figures are encouraging and show very few new arrivals since mid-September: a much greater reduction than the normal seasonal decline at this time of year. There can be hope, therefore, that the problem is finite.
matta
No
2. There are now some 25,000 boat people in Hong Kong. Of those
9,500 arrived after the introduction of screening on 16 June.
ENO screening decisions have yet been announced but, initial results indicate that very few, if any, will qualify to be treated as
refugees: their future lies in Vietnam. The rest, some 15,500,
arrived before the introduction of screening and await
resettlement as refugees. It is the largest population of refugee boat people in the region. Screening will mean that very
few indeed are added to their number. But the current rate of
reduction through resettlement (2,500 in the past 12 months) is unacceptably slow. Even if that level of commitment is sustained it will take a further 6 years before all 15,500 have been
resettled. And over time governments who do not have our own
direct responsibility for Hong Kong will tend to let the territory's needs slip down their list of priorities.
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.