TNAG-1903-FCO40-2705-Hong-Kong-cabinet-meetings-on-Vietnamese-refugees-1990 — Page 52

ANNEX

POLICY OPTIONS

CONFIDENTIAL

1. The Americans and UNHCR would like us to exhaust the

possibilities of voluntary repatriation before resorting to mandatory repatriation. The case for this strategy is that, with 700 volunteers now in the pipeline, we cannot claim that the

voluntary process has been exhausted; and that, because of the logistics involved, and Vietnamese slowness, there is no prospect of

very large numbers of non-volunteers being sent back quickly. We

have, however, concluded that voluntary returns could never match.

the scale of the problem in Hong Kong; nor would such a policy serve

as an effective deterrent to further departures from Vietnam. The

attraction of early mandatory repatriation is that it would be a

clear deterrent signal. Moreover it will be extremely difficult to

keep Hong Kong opinion with us unless we start a mandatory programme

soon.

2.

Another option we have looked at is a Regional Holding Centre for the screened-out (ie non-refugees). But there is no prospect

that any country would be willing to play host to such a centre,

without cast-iron assurances that the inmates will be repatriated

within a finite period. There is little or no prospect of such

assurances.

3

After a promising start, the proposed Regional Processing Centre

in the Philippines (RPCP) for refugees (ie those eligible for

resettlement), conditionally offered by the Philippine Foreign

Minister at the ICIR, has made little progress. The Filipinos have

finally agreed to a feasibility study under UNHCR auspices. But

they still insist on a counterpart camp for the screened-out, in

Vietnam or elsewhere, as a condition for going ahead. If the bulk

of the 13,200 refugees could be moved quickly to the RPCP it would

remove some of the immediate local pressures on the HKG and HMG:

hence our offer to contribute up to £5 million. But the RPCP would

not of course tackle the real problem, which is the future of those who are not refugees and are ineligible for resettlement.

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CONFIDENTIAL