
                         THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
                 Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, June 25, 1994                    TAG: 9406250253 
SECTION: LOCAL                     PAGE: B4    EDITION: FINAL  
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 
DATELINE: 940625                                 LENGTH: ATLANTIC CITY, N.J.

THIRD COUNTRY SOUGHT FOR CHINESE MIGRANTS \

{LEAD} The United States is still trying to enlist the help of an outside nation to return 108 Chinese nationals who were caught when the Coast Guard intercepted their boat, a State Department official said Friday.

The Chinese, who were from Fujian Province on China's southeastern coast, were caught Saturday 350 miles off the Virginia coast when the Coast Guard seized the Captain Denny, a 75-foot scallop boat based in Cape May.

{REST} They remained at sea Friday aboard the Coast Guard cutter Reliance.

The State Department has had success in the past with getting Guatemala and Mexico to accept Chinese nationals while arranging their repatriation, a spokeswoman said.

The spokeswoman, who spoke on condition of anonymity, would not say which countries the State Department was asking for help.

``If they (Chinese nationals) come on U.S. soil, they can remain in this country for a very long period of time. What we can accomplish by going to a third country is we can get them repatriated very quickly,'' she said.

Authorities charged eight people with alien-smuggling on Thursday after the capture of the Captain Denny. Five are in custody in New Jersey, two in Virginia and one in New York.

Kenneth ``David'' Wong, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in China, was described as the mastermind of the smuggling effort by U.S. Attorney Faith Hochberg. He was arrested in New York.

Eighteen people described as ``enforcers'' and six other crew members were brought ashore in handcuffs after the Coast Guard brought the 75-foot fishing vessel Captain Denny into port in Atlantic City.

The status of the 18 wasn't clear Friday, said Dick Lavinthal, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney in Newark.

A bail hearing was scheduled for Wednesday before U.S. Magistrate Joel Rosen in Camden for the ship's captain and four others believed to have been on the crew.

The Captain Denny picked up the aliens from an unnamed ``mother ship'' between June 14 and June 18 in an Atlantic Ocean rendezvous. It wasn't clear where the mother ship was or how long the aliens were at sea.

Last summer, Mexico helped repatriate three boatloads of Chinese nationals seized in a smuggling operation off of Mexico. Guatemala did the same for a boatload intercepted off the coast of San Diego, Calif., in April, the State Department spokeswoman said.

by CNB