Hanoi set-back to talks plan

Press, 22 June 1979, Page 5

Hanoi set-back to talks plan

NZPA-Reuter Bangkok Efforts by the United Nations Secretary-General (Dr Kurt Waldheim) to convene an international conference on the Indo-Chinese refugee crisis appear to have received a set-back with Vietnam’s refusal to attend a wideranging meeting, diplomats in Bangkok have said.

The Vietnamese ViceForeign Minister (Mr Hoang Bich Son) told a press conference in Hanoi that his country was willing to attend an international conference, but only one that would confine its agenda to the implementation of an agreement with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees on regulated departures. Mr Son said: “All other kinds of international conferences are merely designed

to cover up the crimes of the Unied States imperialists and Peking reactionaries,” who the statement claimed were responsible for the massive exodus of Indo-Chinese refugees. South-East Asian and Western countries supporting the idea of a conference appear to want a much broader agenda to “find a solution at sources,” in the words of one senior official in Bangkok.

In Kuala Lumpur, diplomats have said that seven ships are in Vietnam ready to take Vietnamese refugees out of the country to Hong Kong and South-East Asian countries.

Diplomats said the presence of the seven steel ships, capable of carying 2000 or more people each, cast doubts on reports that Vietnam was stopping the flow of refugees.