TNAG-1851-FCO40-2626-House-of-Commons-Select-Committee-on-Foreign-Affairs-enquiry-1989 — Page 136

THE FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEE

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from Vietnam changed. Many countries said they no longer believed these people qualified for resettlement and the problem we faced, and face now in a very acute form, is that we have a continuing large number of people arriving and they have no prospect of resettlement elsewhere because many resettlement countries say they do not qualify." Mr Geoffrey Barnes, Secretary for Security, told us in evidence on 21 April: "This year we have had 784 people resettled from Hong Kong, which at the present rate is about one and a half week's arrivals."2 Faced with a declining level of acceptances by resettlement countries and a suddenly and massively increasing population of boat people, we believe that the Hong Kong Government had no alternative but to introduce a screening policy.

5.3. The Hong Kong Government told us that "The criteria for screening were based on guidelines laid down by the UNHCR under the 1951 Convention and the 1967 Protocol relating to the status of refugees... Those who are found not be refugees are held in a detention centre pending their repatriation to Vietnam."3 Efforts to encourage voluntary repatriation have had disappointing results. In evidence to the Committee in support of OMELCO's memorandum, Mrs Rita Fan said, "Hong Kong in the past has experienced large influxes of illegal immigrants, and we have found from experience that the best way is to repatriate in groups-large numbers-on a mandatory basis."4

5.4. Indeed during 1988 the Hong Kong authorities compulsorily and immediately returned illegal immigrants from mainland China at an average rate of 54 a day. Whilst not objecting to this as such, Hong Kong people tend to contrast it with a perceived weakness in dealing with the Vietnamese. In our view a screening policy cannot be sustained without the repatriation of those who are screened out. In the words of Mr Barnes, "If you are screening you must have resettlement and you must have repatriation."" Around 90 per cent of those who have been screened have been screened out; all have appealed against the decision. There has been very little voluntary repatriation, and the successful experience of the first small batch does not seem to have encouraged others. We accept that the logical consequence of a screening programme is the repatriation of those who have been screened out. We believe that, in the absence of significant levels of voluntary repatriation, however regrettable it may be, there is no alternative to the mandatory repatriation of those who are screened out. We note that these people are fleeing not from persecution but from extreme poverty and that over 50 per cent of them are under the age of 20 years. This calls for special ways in dealing with these young people and if as a last resort, they must return to Vietnam, the authorities dealing with them must act in a humane way and ensure that they are adequately provided for. Assistance should also be given to allow them to settle down in Vietnam.

5.5. The recent Geneva Conference has affirmed that all those classed as refugees should be resettled within three years. A number of western countries committed themselves to take additional numbers, including Britain, which, as Sir Geoffrey Howe told us on 14 June, promised to take another one thousand refugees.' Additionally the Philippines offered to provide land for a Regional Holding Centre for refugees. Britain is prepared to contribute financially towards this, as long as others do likewise. Assuming the commitments made at the Geneva Conference are honoured, it now seems possible that the Vietnamese refugee problem can be solved. But not the problem of the Vietnamese Boat People.

5.6. For those who are not classified as refugees there remains little hope. On 12 June Sir David Wilson told us of his hopes from the Geneva Conference for these people, to which he was flying that evening, “It is simply not humane that they should be left in limbo in detention centres, without the world community facing the fact that, like illegal immigrants from anywhere else, they ought to go back to where they came from, to Vietnam, with conditions which are humane conditions, so they will not be persecuted by going back to Vietnam." He continued, "they are... not trying to go to Hong Kong but to go to places of resettlement. Above all, they are trying to go to North America which has said that these people do not qualify for resettlement in the United States as ordinary refugees because they come from

Q 143.

1

2 Q614.

3 Evidence p 34.

• Q 238.

› Evidence p 35.

• Q 614.

7 Q 1003.

• Q 933.