Liberia: UN refugee agency scrambles to help spontaneous returnees

With Liberians returning from neighbouring Sierra Leone and Guinea in a sign of increased confidence in the West African country’s peace process, the United Nations refugee agency said today it was scrambling to provide emergency relief since poor security in some areas did not allow returnees to go back to their homes.

“The worrying aspect of this trend is that many of these spontaneous returnees end up displaced inside Liberia,” UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) spokesman Kris Janowski told a news briefing in Geneva. He noted that over 5,000 returnees from Sierra Leone were presently at a way-station in Monrovia, the capital, and in internally displaced persons (IDP) camps nearby.

“UNHCR and its partners are continuing to do their best to monitor the return and assist with emergency relief where possible,” Mr. Janowski said. Spontaneous returns are expected to peak in the coming months and continue at a high level during the first months of next year in the run-up to presidential elections scheduled for 2005, he added.

On Tuesday alone, over 800 Liberians from Sierra Leone arrived at the border crossing in Bo. UNHCR quickly responded by sending additional trucks to transport them on to Monrovia.

According to rough estimates there are over 10,000 returnees in Grand Cape Mount county, near the Sierra Leonean border, 11,500 in Bong across from Guinea, and a mixed population of 35,000 returnees and IDPs in northern Lofa County, where the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has distributed food, agricultural tools and seeds.

UNHCR plans to facilitate the return and reintegration of an estimated 320,000 refugees and 300,000 camp-based internally displaced people this year, pending the full deployment of troops from the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) and improved security and access in the areas of return.

UNMIL was set up after a ceasefire agreement last August between government and rebel forces ended 15 years of civil wars that had devastated the impoverished country.