U.N. refugee chief praises N.Z. effort

Press, 17 June 1985, Page 13

U.N. refugee chief praises N.Z. effort

PA Wellington New Zealand was very conscientious about its humanitarian tasks in accepting its share of refugees, the United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees, Mr William Smyser, has said. For its size, New Zealand did “pretty well” and had contributed significantly to the work of the Genevabased Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, he said. Mr Smyser, an American who was previously director of the State Department’s refugee programme, is in New Zealand for a threeday visit. He has met the Minister of Immigration, Mr Burke, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr O’Flynn, and Ministry of Foreign Affairs officials. He has also visited the refugee reception centre at Mangere, Auckland, which he described as one of the best that he has seen. Rather than asking New Zealand to take more refugees, Mr Smyser said he had been keeping the Government up to date on the international refugee situation. “This is not a country where I need to go in with a shopping list. I tell them what the situation is and they usually know what is

required and they help us.” While his organisation always needed more money — some of the organisation’s programmes had to be cut this year because the African emergency used up so many resources — New Zealand had done a great deal.

“I am always happy to get larger contributions, but. having said that, I have not come here to complain.” Last year 807 refugees entered New Zealand, including 540 Kampucheans, 114 Vietnamese, and 51 Lao. Mr Smyser said the number of boat people trying to

escape Indo-China each year was now less than it had been in the late 19705, but the exodus was still expected to number 20,000 this, year. However, last year more people had left Vietnam under the Orderly Departure Programme — a scheme designed to help countries interested in bringing certain people out when the Vietnamese Government indicated that they could leave. The boat people were also at the mercy of pirates, and there had been some nasty attacks recently, he said.