REFUGEE resettlement countries have launched a last-ditch effort to find places for the remaining Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong and elsewhere in the region.
Australia is leading the way with plans to relax health requirements later this year which will pave the way for previously rejected people with long-term health problems to go to Australia.
All resettlement countries are required under an international plan to have decided who they can accept by the end of this year so the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) can determine how many are left over.
A handful of the 1,700 refugees in Hong Kong have accepted that they will not be resettled and expressed a wish to be repatriated. However, Vietnam has indicated that it is not willing to accept them, despite the issue being raised at international technical talks in June.
A spokesman at the Australian Consulate in Hong Kong said yesterday Australia was determined to be as flexible as possible and a change in regulations would be introduced towards the end of the year.
It would involve the implementation of a waiver which would allow immigration authorities to look more flexibly at refugees with health concerns that would not put the Australian community at risk.
'It would mean that people with health problems such as diabetes, high blood pressure and the like who have long-term problems and would be a long-term cost to the community, could become eligible,' she said.