By Associated Press,
PARIS — A team of French military doctors headed to the Syria-Jordan border on Thursday to set up a mobile hospital to treat refugees fleeing Syrian violence by the thousands.
The medics aim to be operative by the end of the week and to perform up to 10 surgeries a day on those wounded in fighting, said Col. Gerard Dosseh before boarding a flight at Paris’ Charles de Gaulle airport.
He was among some 25 medical personnel on the team, which is bringing about 20 tons of medical equipment to Amman, Jordan, and then to a site a few dozen kilometers from the border.
France, Syria’s onetime colonial ruler, has been in the forefront of diplomatic efforts to end fighting in Syria, which has sent some 250,000 refugees fleeing to neighboring countries, and to press for a democratic transition. But as fighting intensifies, concern is focusing on the growing refugee crisis as Syrians spill out of their homeland.
“There will be many wounded who have crossed the Jordanian-Syrian border, those wounded by gunfire who will need surgery,” Dosseh told AP Television News.
The Italians have also set up a field hospital in northern Jordan near the Syrian border that started operating in early July.
The French move comes as diplomatic efforts to halt the war in Syria remain stymied, with Russia and China using their veto power to block U.N. Security Council resolutions that would increase pressure on President Bashar Assad.
PressTV comments: French Army on the border of Syria.