Hospital ship takes 837

Press, 10 July 1979, Page 8

Hospital ship takes 837

NZPA-Reuter Singapore) The French hospital ship i. He de Lumiere has arrived! in Singapore with 837 Vietnamese refugees it [picked up in the South China Sea. Of the 837 refugees, 300 were picked up from the oilrig supply ship Canadian T.VD.E. on Saturday. The supply ship came across the I refugees on Friday as their [boat was sinking. The refugees claimed that they had bem attacked by I pirates who had raped some I of the women and had taken I some of their goods. Their engine was wrecked by the [pirates and it was taking in water when the Canadian ship came by. The refugees left Camau on June 30. Since France is taking in the refugees from the hospi- < tai ship, the Singapore Government has allowed them to land. The French Minister for foreign Affairs (Mr Olivier IStirn) visited Hie He de Lu- : m.ere, stationed off the ; Pulau Bidong refugee camp, 305 km north-east of Singapore on July 1. He said any refugee 'picked up by the hospital

(ship on its journey to Singapore would be given per- ! manent residence in France. The ship, sent by French charitable organisations to Pulau Bidong in April, was being sent away because a hospital is nearing completion on Bulau Bidong to serve the 42,000 refugees there. The hospital ship is to be refitted in Singapore, and it will leave for the Anambas Islands of Indonesia in the South China Sea to serve about 34,000 refugees there. Mr Stirn said any refugee picked up by the ship on its way to and back from Anambas would also be taken in by France. In Liverpool, tenants of council houses yesterday were amazed when housing officials wrote telling them they had been chosen to take Vietnamese boat people into their homes. They were even more shocked when told that they must have cholera injections to reduc.. the risk of disease. But the official-looking letters sent to scores of tenants have been revealed as a hoax — and the police are investigating.