Toward a New Consensus on the Vietnamese Boat People

TOWARD A NEW CONSENSUS. ON THE VIETNAMESE BOAT PEOPLE Daniel Wolf and Shep Lowman O? July 20, 1979, the nations of the world gathered in Geneva to put an end to the terrible human tragedy which was then occurring in Southeast Asia. Overwhelmed by the arrival ofhundreds ofthousands of asylum-seekers attempting to escape communist oppression in Indochina, authorities of the neighboring non-communist countries were pushing Vietnamese boat people back to sea and Cambodian and Lao refugees back over land borders. Many thousands of lives were being lost as a result. By securing a commitment from the Western countries to extend offers ofpermanent resettlement to all Indochinese refugees, the Geneva Conference succeeded in persuading the countries of the region to discontinue their inhumane push-back policies and to grant temporary safe haven to all asylum-seekers who reached their territory. Ten years later, on June 13 and 14, 1989, the international community met once again in Geneva to address the persistent and accelerating flow of Indochinese refugees. This time, however, their motives were fundamentally different. Concerned with eliminating what had become a significant source of domestic political tension, the Daniel Wolf is a senior consultant with Refugees International, a Washingtonbased organization concerned with refugee rights, and an attorney with the Washington, D.C. office ofHughes Hubbard & Reed. Mr. Wolfrecently returned from Hong Kong where he spent three months investigating the plight of the Vietnamese Boat People. Shep Lowman is president and executive director of Refugees International. Mr. Lowman has spent much ofthe last 30 years at the U.S. Department of State working on refugee and Southeast Asian issues. 101 102 SAISREVIEW Southeast Asian states and Hong Kong had called for the second Geneva Conference not to expand asylum possibilities, but to restrict them sharply and to stop Vietnamese from fleeing their country. Finding a largely sympathetic Western audience, the first-asylum states secured unanimous approval for an agreement to establish a region-wide screening process under which those who could not prove their entitlement to refugee status would be expected to return to their country of origin. Six months later, on December 11, 1989, Hong Kong authorities, in accordance with British policy, herded fifty-one Vietnamese boat people, many crying and screaming, aboard a plane bound for Hanoi in the first forcible repatriation effort. Today, it seems only a matter of time before other first-asylum states in the region emulate the example set by Hong Kong. The disintegration of the consensus which for ten years protected Vietnamese asylum-seekers is the product of a profound change in the conventional wisdom concerning the nature ofthis group. Once viewed as persons fleeing communist persecution, the boat people are now seen as "economic migrants" who have been lured out of Vietnam by the opportunity for resettlement and the promise of a better life in the West. Conveniently overlooking the fact that it was they who first insisted on Western resettlement as the price of temporary refuge, first-asylum states now argue that the boat people should be denied resettlement and forcibly returned home in order to deter others from coming. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that in their haste to eliminate the political problems posed by the continuing flow of Vietnamese boat people, officials in first-asylum and resettlement states have distorted the nature of the flow so as to create the impression that the boat people can be safely returned to Vietnam. While the forcible repatriation of some Vietnamese asylum-seekers might under certain circumstances be appropriate, those circumstances do not now exist. Consequently, repatriation at this time would subject those who are returned to a risk of persecution which is both morally and legally unacceptable. No quick and final solution to the Vietnamese refugee problem can resolve the problem in a humane way. Nevertheless, deterrent measures can be taken, short of involuntary repatriation and inhumane treatment, which will reduce the outflow from Vietnam to more manageable levels, while at the same time protecting the lives, the freedom, and the dignity of those who opt for flight by boat. VIETNAMESE BOAT PEOPLE 103 The Emerging Crisis The dramatic exodus ofmore than one million Vietnamese began with the collapse...