When the steering committee first met, in 1989, hundreds of thousands of people were escaping out of Viet Nam and Laos by land and boat.
The Conference on Indo-Chinese Refugees wanted Viet Nam and the Lao People's Democratic Republic to be involved in the solution for this problem, as well as first-asylum countries, (Indonesia, Malaysia, The Philippines, Hong Kong, Thailand) and resettlement countries, to share responsibility for the asylum seekers and guarantee asylum to all refugees.
The Conference also demanded that every asylum seeker would receive refuge in first-asylum countries and not be pushed back, when the process of determination of his or her refugee claim was pending.
Rejected asylum seekers were to return to their home countries, whose governments agreed to refrain from any discrimination, harassment, persecution or unfair treatment.
Extensive monitoring procedures were also established in the countries of origin, and financial assistance was provided to the returnees and to the communities which agreed to accept them back.