Conservative Government

: Canadian civil servants are capable of assessing possible security risks among Syrian refugees, Clark said, as they did when his government sent teams of officials overseas to process thousands of Vietnamese applicants living in crowded refugee camps, according to The Chronicle Herald. Joe Clark Clark said his Progressive Conservative government adopted and expanded on the policies put in place by a former Liberal government to directly assist Indochinese refugees who fled in rickety boats after the Communists took power in Hanoi. We have the capacity to do more...I think everyone recognizes that and we have a tradition of doing more, he said in an interview Friday from his home in Ottawa. At the time, he said his cabinet was concerned some refugee applicants might be criminals or Communist officials who could pose risks to Canada, but his senior officials were capable of screening applicants. With strong political direction from the federal cabinet, Clark said it possible to send Canadian officials to United Nations refugee camps, where they can directly meet and interview applicants. The possibility there are some people who are not who they claim to be should not deter us at all from proceeding with a very vigorous strategy of identifying people and getting them here quickly, he said. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.