video transcript

Actress turned UN Envoy Angelina Jolie travelled to the Jordan-Syria border to meet frightened and exhausted Syrian refugees. Nearly half a million Syrians fleeing intensified fighting have been registered in neighboring countries such as Jordan since the conflict began. This family from Damascus said they had no choice but to flee: SOUNDBITE: Woman refugee, saying (Arabic with English translation) : "When the bombing got really fierce and hard and non-stopping, they use to hide in the holes under the ground. Even with the children, because it is safe, especially at night, so when the weather got bad and raining started to take place, all of these holes under the ground were flooded with water, so it wasn't suitable. Also they didn't have enough bread in the bakery and it was also another reason that they started to suffer shortage of food, so because of the weather conditions, because of the rain they were not able to stay in those sheltered areas." Since the UN's refugee agency's last visit in September, the number of registered Syrian refugees in the region has increased by more than 200,000 and in Jordan alone by nearly 50,000. As well as using her star status to focus the eyes of the world's media on the area - Angelina Jolie and her partner, Brad Pitt, also made a donation of 50,000 dollars for the purchase of family tents for refugees.