TNAG-1911-FCO40-2715-Financial-assistance-from-the-UK-Government-to-Vietnamese-re-1989 — Page 39

4. This 4.5 million has now been transferred to the Hong Kong Government and disbursed. It was used to pay for the hire of

ferries, the supply of tents and the construction of accommodation at the Sek Kong, High Island and whitehead camps.

5. The FCO is currently seeking approval from the Treasury for further additional funds in connection with improvements to the

emergency accommodation already under construction so as to ensure

that it is secure and able to withstand severe weather conditions.

Treasury approval is also being sought for a contribution to the

further costs of building a new long term camp to cope with the inevitable

which it would be prudent to plan for influx of Vietnamese boat people in the Spring and Summer of 1990. Parliament will be notified of the sums involved in the Spring Supplementary Estimates.

(B) REPATRIATION

6. Mr Maude informed the House in answer to a written Parliamentary Question on 28 July that the Government have made contingency plans

to contribute up to £1.3 million towards the cost of repatriating Vietnamese boat people from Hong Kong to Vietnam in this financial

year.

7. It was agreed by all the countries represented at the

International Conference on Indo Chinese Refugees in June that all those who are determined, after screening, to be non refugees,

should return to Vietnam. We hope that substantial numbers will

volunteer to go back. But it is already clear that voluntary

returns alone cannot provide a comprehensive solution to the

problem. There are now over 3,000 boat people in Hong Kong who have been definitively screen out, of whom only 37 have volunteered. boat people would be returned without clear assurances from the

Vietnamese authorities that they will not be punished or persecuted

on return, nor without monitoring arrangements to ensure that these

assurances were honoured.

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