Comunidad del pacífico en perspectiva - Volumen 2

AN AUSTRALlAN VIEW OF THE PACIFIC BASIN ven from the country, most of them having been stripped of their wealth beforehand. Between a quarter and a half of those who took to the open sea have been drowned. Many more, both of Chinese and Vietnamese ethrÍic origin, will certainly by expelled under similar conditions. The burden of this wave .of refugees has initially fallen upon Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines. In each case, the fear of .absorbing tens of thousands of .intruders, unwanted both in economic and polítical terms, has led to extremely harsh treatment. This has included turning refugees back at the frontier, disallowing boats from landing, or re-shipping them out to sea after a short period in a makeshift campo Atone point the Malaysians even threatened to shoot all those who attempted to land. This has superimposed a new strain on the potentially unstable situation in South East Asia, which stems variously from deep sea– ted economic, social, racial and religious tensions, wide disparatics in ,income distribution, insurgencies and high rates of inflation. The próspects are frightening and the implications for Australia are obvious. There are, moreover, implications for all ,the nations of the Pa– cific Basin, not only for those in the Asian part of it. Already Canada and the United States are taking some share of the bur– aen but others, including the countries of Latin America, must do so too. Countries like J apan, which by virtue .of populatio,n pressure cannot take people, must provide money. The problem of the boat people .touches the whole of the Pacific Basin. The second strategic observation, taken a stage further north, concerns a number of areas of potential conflict of ;varying degrees of intensity. There existis a potential point of friction between the USRR and the USA based on the simple fact ,that these two nations each have a capacity to destroy the other. Detente holds at present, but it is a fragile planto The I long. disputed, not wholly demarcated Sino-Soviet bor– der, an the fear of each country for the other, is likely to delay for a long time to come any normalisation of relations between these two countries. 79