Italy Sends Field Hospital to Syrians in Jordan

Italy on Tuesday dispatched a field hospital to Jordan to help treats tens of thousands of Syrian refugees who have fled violence in their country.

The hospital will be set up in the northern city of Mafraq near the border "to provide health care to displaced persons in Jordan from Syria and to local communities that host them," an Italian embassy statement said.

"A 12-member team of Italian medical staff will set up and operate the hospital, which will later be managed by the Royal Medical Services of the Jordan Armed Forces."

The embassy said that on June 13, Italy sent six medical kits to the Syrian capital of Damascus for "the generic treatment of 30,000 people for three months."

The kits were handled by the U.N. refuge agency, UNHCR and the Syrian Red Crescent, it said, adding that two more medical kits were sent on the same day to Jordan to aid 20,000 Syrians.

Jordan is hosting 140,000 Syrian refugees, Information Minister Samih Maaytah told the government-owned Al-Rai daily on Tuesday.

According to the prominent Ketab and Sunna charity, which takes care of around 50,000 Syrian refugees in Jordan, "at least 20,000 Syrians fled to the kingdom during the past month (June)."

"In the last two days, more than 1,000 Syrians escaped to Jordan," Zayed Hammad, head the charity, told AFP on Tuesday.

More than 16,500 people have been killed in violence in Syria since the uprising against President Bashar Assad erupted in March last year, according to the human rights groups.