Flow of boat people declining

Press, 16 April 1980, Page 21

Flow of boat people declining

By

KENNETH WHITING,

Associated

Press, through NZPA

The boat people are still coming out. They are not as many as last year when the exodus was in full flow and Malaysia and other South-East Asian countries feared they would be swamped by homeless Indochinese.

Refugee workers counted 2965 '*• arrivals throughout the region last month, compared to 3166 just in Malaysia in February, 1979. More than half of February’s total landed in Thailand, according to the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (U.N.H.C.R.). Hong Kong held 47,341 refugees at the end of February. There were 25,095 in Malaysia, 22,694 in Indonesia, 5980 in Thailand, 3865 in the Philippines, plus another 6729 earmarked for resettlement in a special U.N.H.C.R. camp 80 kilometres west of Manila, and 575 in Singapore. In addition, Thailand had

276,541 “land people,” most of whom fled Kampuchea and Laos. One refugee specialist quoted doctors at Malay-, sia’s Bidong Island Camp as saying that 200 of the last 1800 women to reach there had been raped. Nine Vietnamese in one group plucked from the South China Sea by the mercy vessel Cap Anamut had gunshot wounds, he said. At least 79 refugees in three boats were killed by pirates earlier this year near Koh Kra in Southern Thailand.

Several cases of alleged piracy and rape are .-moving through. Malaysian and Thai courts. Prosecution is sometimes hampered by victims who prefer fast resettlement to staying behind for court appearances.

Malaysian newspapers recently reported that 37 sailors had been dishonourably discharged from the navy for maltreating boat people.

Senior government officials last year denied charges by Vietnamese who said they had been assaulted by crewmen from Malaysian Navy craft assigned to stop refugees from reaching shore.

Sources said Malaysia has not towed away boat people since October, presumably because of the relatively few arrivals and fast resettlement in third countries.

More than 10,000 Vietnamese have left this year for new homes, mostly in the United States. Malaysia had fewer than 24,000 boat people this week, compared to a peak of 76,500 last July.

At least two-thirds of those in Malaysia have firm resettlement offers. “About 5000 are now being processed and another 5000 or so have

had no offers,” said one refugee administrator. Refugee workers said the Government is expected to start closing four smaller camps and concentrate the remaining boat people on the island

of Bidong and Tengah. “If there is no fresh wave, all those here could be out of Malaysia within six months,” the administrator said. He discounted the possibility that any of the boat people would be rejected by any third country. All signs indicate Hanoi is keeping the promise it made last July at an international conference in Geneva to stop the exodus. The flow slowed to a trickle and those who do flee insist they slipped out without permission and paid no bribes to Government agents.

“There are fewer children on the boats these days, a sure sign that adults don’t want to risk their young in clandestine escapes,” the administrator said. For months, diplomats and other analysts have been predicting a. fresh wave of boat people. Their reasoning was that Hanoi responded only under intense international pressure which has since eased. Some assert that Vietnam is still eager to get rid of the rest of its ethnic Chinese, who are regarded as potential troublemakers, especially with food in short supply and the economy in a mess. “The north-east monsoon is finished now, although the South China Sea has been rough recently,” said one analyst, who asked not to be identified. “April or May might show once and for all whether the exodus resumes.”