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these economic migrants do not qualify for settlement.
Since June 1988, Hong Kong has screened all arrivals.
Genuine refugees will eventually be resettled. But what
about the rest?
Earlier this year, at an international conference
in Geneva, the world agreed that ultimately people who are
not refugees must go back to their own homes. Hong Kong
has urged and continues to urge that this should not be
delayed that people should not be kept in camps,
fostering false illusions of resettlement
-
that thousands
of young children should not be left to grow up in camp
environments
-
that they should be given back a real
childhood in their own homes.
All this is now again being discussed in Geneva.
We understand American sensitivities on this issue. You
have a difficult history of relations with Vietnam, But,
as you look at the problem we and others in South East Asia
face in dealing with tens of thousands of people who want
to come here to the United State but will never get here I
ask you to look at how we are trying to deal with the human
tragedy with understanding and sympathy.
Just as the flood of boatpeople reached crisis
proportions earlier this year, the student movement began
in Peking. It quickly and tragically overshadowed all
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