A hundred Liberian refugees flew home from Ghana on Friday, the first of 340,000 scattered across West Africa by the country's civil war to be repatriated by the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR). "There is nowhere like home. We can stay out for many years but if we do not come back home, we are nothing," said Harry Naplah, 35, after landing in the capital Monrovia. "I left because of the war but today I'm happy that there's no more war in our country," said Naplah, from the southeast of Liberia, who fled his homeland last year. Liberia's transitional government hosted a ceremony at the airport to welcome the returnees. It was the departure of former President Charles Taylor into exile in August last year as rebel fighters shelled the crumbling capital that paved the way for a 15,000-strong U.N. force to deploy in the West African country. The UNHCR aims to repatriate 100,000 Liberians this year, 154,000 in 2005 and 65,000 the year after. "This is a real milestone in the recovery of a country that not long ago seemed hopelessly mired in conflict, corruption and misery. Obviously this is sign of new hope for Liberia," UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond told a briefing on Friday in Geneva.
