MP horrified by carnage of civil war in Syria

Jacqui Dean has seen first-hand the horror of Syria's civil war.

The MP for Waitaki, North Otago, visited a refugee camp in Jordan, and said 250 desperate people were fleeing from Syria every night - and that was at only one point on the 375km border between the countries.

As a member of the Israel-New Zealand Friendship group, Mrs Dean was invited to a refugee camp at the Jordanian town of Ramtha as part of a two-day goodwill mission to Israel, Jordan and Palestine on May 17.

"We went up to a town, which was in the north of Jordan, about 20km from the Syrian border. We met with the deputy governor whose job it was to process the refugees crossing the Syrian border at night.

"What he and his team did was to receive refugees crossing the border, those that needed immediate medical attention get shunted straight off to hospital and the rest of them go into what is a transit camp.

"We went into the transit camp where families stay for between 24 hours to three days. If they have families in Jordan who are prepared to sponsor them they can then be sponsored and go into Jordan to live as citizens; if they can't and they don't have the funds to get out of the Middle East then they go into a couple of other camps.

"The conditions were very, very rudimentary, but they were fed and had medical assistance."

Mrs Dean met one couple and their five children who had made a five-day, 380km trip on foot from Homs to cross the border - a week before the massacre of more than 100 people near the town on May 25.

The former Foreign Affairs Select Committee member said she was impressed with the attitude of the Jordanians towards the refugees.