More refugees expected

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33446, 30 January 1974, Page 18

More refugees expected

Five more refugee families from Chile are expected in New Zealand by I the end of the week, including three for Christchurch.

I As usual, arrival plans iare indefinite. In fact, it was not certain the families would arrive at all, said Miss B. E. Smith, resettlement officer for the National Council of Churches, yesterday.

The refugees are leaving Chile under pressure from the military junta. During the previous Government of President Allende they went to Chile as political refugees from other countries. TIME LAG

Dr K. Clements, a lecturer in sociology at the University of Canterbury, and the council’s policy adviser on refugees, yesterday blamed slow communication between Santiago and the Immigration Department in Wellington for the time taken to fill New Zealand’s quota of 20 families.

Since early December only six families have been accepted for New Zealand. Other countries were accepting the refugees the Immigration Department was still checking, he said. Families applied for four countries, and because of pressure to be out of Chile before the February 3 deadline, they took the first

country that approved their application. It took at least three days for acceptance of telex messages of application. Dr Clements said. “If you have a demarcation dispute going on between the New Zealand Security Service and Foreign Affairs, as happened in one case, it complicates things even further.”

At present applications to the New Zealand Embassy in Santiago are telexed to the New Zealand Immigration Department, which approves sponsors and return instructions to Santiago for a medical check and security clearance. The application is then sent back to Wellington for final approval. During this time applicants could be “whisked away” to Germany or France, said Miss Smith. This had happened in two cases. CABLE TO BISHOP

Dr Clements said that the New Zealand Embassy in Santiago was not very active in its search for applicants. A cable to Bishop Helmut Frenz, a church leader in Chile, asking him to encourage applications to the embassy had been followed by two or three fresh applications, but no reply had been received from the Bishop. Refugee camps in Chile will close on February 3, and although no recent news of numbers affected is available, it is expected that some hundreds will become political prisoners.

Church groups in Christchurch will sponsor families, paying the rent for a home, finding employment for the breadwinner, and arranging English language classes for the children.

Rent will be paid only until a regular income is being earned.