World IN BRIEF : HONG KONG : 120 Vietnamese Are Repatriated

Hong Kong deported 120 Vietnamese asylum-seekers as part of stepped-up efforts to clear detention camps in the territory before its reversion to China in 1997. The flight of 55 men, 29 women and 36 children to Hanoi was the third in a series of forced repatriations of 600 people this month alone--Hong Kong’s biggest deportation program. The majority had been in detention in the territory’s prison-like camps for about seven years. More than 18,000 asylum-seekers remain in Hong Kong out of about 30,000 Vietnamese languishing in camps across Asia.