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addition, we should go for special measures to cope with the present emergency, notably an Over-spill Centre for those eligible for resettlement.
8.
In commending this approach to others, we should seek common cause with the ASEANS and the support of the Australians. Our main argument will be that, unpalatable as mandatory repatriation may be, the alternatives are worse: the threat to the principle of first asylum and/or intolerable numbers of boat people held indefinitely in deteriorating conditions. With the UNHCR (including during Hocke's forthcoming visit), we shall have to continue to make plain our view that mandatory repatriation has to come sooner or later and that it is in everybody's interests for us all to cooperate now in ensuring that this happens in an acceptable
manner.
Regional Holding Centre(s) (RHC)/Over-spill Centre(s)
9. We got a little closer to distilling the range of theoretical options (the vocabulary of which is still in the developmental stage!):
(a) Over-spill Centre(s). This would be for boat people
eligible for resettlement, ie those who arrived before the various cut-off dates plus those screened in. The 1979 conference established a good precedent for such centres, and the idea ought to be attractive to UNHCR and others. It would help Hong Kong to the extent that some 15,000 boat people could go elsewhere, clearing space for further arrivals awaiting screening. This idea would not, however, get us any closer to dealing with the problem of those screened out.
(b) RHC(s), whether in Southern China, Vietnam or elsewhere in the region, eg Philippines. This would be intended for recent and continuing arrivals awaiting screening, and for the screened out (as provided for in the CPA). The rub of course is that no-one is likely to welcome the establishment of such a centre on their territory unless there is some pretty firm guarantee that the commitment will be of finite duration and financing is guaranteed. This, in turn, depends on progress towards mandatory repatriation. Nor are UNHCR likely to find this attractive, although Hocke controversially conceded the point in the CPA. The ICM might be prepared to take on the actual running of the Centre(s).
10.
We concluded that both these broad options were worth pursuing, with the former perhaps offering the greater prospect of early agreement insofar as it would not involve mandatory repatriation. Certainly, this general area of consideration raises fewer spectres than involuntary
repatriation.
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