Using live ammunition, six F-16s, two AV-8B Harrier jets, 28 tanks, 20 armoured personnel carriers, 800 US and Jordanian troops took part in a 45-minute drill in Quweira close to the Red Sea port of Aqaba as part of "Eager Lion 2013," which wraps up on Thursday.

Fighters, attack helicopters and tanks attacked ground targets as Jordan's army chief, General Mashal Mohammad Zaben, and King Abdullah II's brother, Prince Faisal watched.

"The goal of the drill is to boost and enhance the capabilities and performance of the Jordanian Armed Forces, including ways to deal with situations in which refugees are involved," Colonel Mekhled Suheim, Eager Lion spokesman, told journalists watching the exercise.

Jordan says it is home to more than 500,000 refugees from next-door Syria and its brutal civil war.

Worried about a possible spillover of violence from Syria to Jordan, a key US ally, Washington has sent a Patriot missile battery and F-16s to the kingdom for the 12-day manoeuvres, and decided to keep them there to counter the threat posed by the Syrian conflict.

But US and Jordanian officials have declined to say how many F-16s would be taking part in the joint exercise, aside from the six seen on Wednesday, or how many might stay on afterwards.

US media reports have said Washington was preparing to use the weapons to enforce a no-fly zone over Syria from Jordan, but the White House has ruled out the idea, billing it as difficult, dangerous, costly and unsuitable.

"Eager Lion 2013 is a great opportunity to share expertise and boost capabilities (of troops)," Brigadier General Gregg P. Olson of the Marine Corps Forces Central Command said as he mingled with journalists.

Following the drill in Quweira, the army drove journalists about 50 kilometres (31 miles) to Aqaba's anti-terrorist unit.

Some 50 US Navy SEALs as well as Jordanian and Iraqi special operations troops took part in a 30-minute mock exercise to rescue hostages on a ship "hijacked" by pirates off the coast of Aqaba.

Eight Jordanian gunboats and three attack helicopters intercepted the ship. Masked frogmen boarded it and took control before rescuing the hostages.

"This is a difficult exercise because the target is moving," said a US officer as he observed the operation.

Frogmen later raided a building on the beach in another mock drill to arrest the mock terrorists, using coloured smoke bombs and tear gas.

Suheim said the destroy USS Stockdale will leave Jordanian waters after Eager Lion concludes.

Around 4,500 US troops, 3,000 Jordanian soldiers and 500 observers from 19 countries, including Britain, France, Italy, Qatar, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, are participating in the exercise, staging battlefield, logistics and humanitarian exercises.

"The US troops will start departing Jordan on June 25," Major General Robert G Catalanotti of the US Army Central Command told AFP.

A US defence official has said that, after consultations with Jordan, the Americans would also keep a unit of Marines on amphibious ships off the country's Red Sea coast.

The Pentagon had already sent about 200 troops to Jordan to help it prepare for possible military action in Syria, including scenarios to secure the regime's chemical weapons stockpiles.

Jordan is a major beneficiary of US military and economic aid, with Washington granting $2.4 billion (1.85 billion euros) over the past five years, according to official figures.

Explorers struck oil in east Africa's third largest economy in 2006 and Uganda estimates its crude reserves at 3.5 billion barrels, but wrangling over taxes and the viability of a local refinery have stalled production.

Uganda currently transports all of its fuel imported primarily through Kenya's Mombasa seaport in tankers over several hundred kilometres of road. Officials say the method is unreliable, costly and damages roads.

Fred Kabanda, principal geologist at Uganda's petroleum exploration and production department, said a 30,000 barrel a day refinery is expected to be operational in 2016 at the earliest, with output expected to double two years from then.

The third-biggest economy in east Africa aims to build the refinery as a private-public partnership with its neighbours, in exchange for a stake in the facility, he said.

In April Uganda agreed with France's Total and China's CNOOC to build a smaller refinery than it had wanted. The companies favoured a pipeline to export most of the crude via Kenya's Indian Ocean coastline, saying there was insufficient local demand for a refinery of the size Uganda proposed.

Total and CNOOC entered Uganda in 2012, taking up a third each of British explorer Tullow Oil's exploration assets for a total of $2.9 billion.

The United Nations and international police organization Interpol may soon issue a global alert over members of the family and other associates who are on the run and face UN sanctions.

Aisha and Mohammed face a travel ban and assets freeze imposed in the months before their father was overthrown and killed in October 2011.

Eugene-Richard Gasana, Rwanda's UN ambassador and chairman of the Security Council committee that monitors sanctions on Libya, said the committee had been told of the pair's move from Algeria, where they fled in 2011, to Oman.

Under UN sanctions rules, the committee should have approved any travel, but Gasana said this was not done and that UN sanctions experts are investigating.

Gasana said the sanctions committee and Interpol are finalizing an accord on issuing joint special notices on Libya sanctions targets. He said the accord would come into force "in the coming weeks."

The blast took place shortly after midday prayers in the Habib ibn al-Mudhaher Hussainiyah in the capital's Qahira neighbourhood, the interior ministry and police sources said.

At least 30 people were wounded in the attack.

The defections of the 71 army officers and two policemen came after Washington said it had proof that Syrian government forces had carried out deadly chemical weapons attacks against rebels and the United States would begin providing military support to the opposition.

Along with her sick husband and three children, she fled the town in Syria's central province of Homs in the hours before it fell on June 5 to regime forces backed by Lebanon's Hezbollah.

They had to watch fellow Syrians who died on the way buried hastily by the roadside as they made for the safety of Arsal town across the border inside Lebanon.

Now they are struggling to survive, with no shelter of their own and almost no way to feed themselves. When food is handed out, the refugees queue in their hundreds for rations.

"We left in group after group a few hours before the fall of the town. We were practically running, it was everyone for themselves," Jamila says, her sick husband lying on a mattress nearby.

"Dozens died of thirst, or their injuries, or just plain exhaustion," she says, wrapped in a black veil, her voice faltering.

"The men dug graves in a hurry to bury those who died. It was horrible." Thirst was a constant companion, with the refugees so desperate that they tried to draw sap from twigs and drops of water from irrigation hoses.

Guided by rebel fighters, they ate fruit from trees along the route, and even raw potatoes dug up from fields.

The conflict in Syria, now in its third year, has changed the face of Arsal, a town of 40,000 residents that is now also home to some 35,000 refugees, including 3,000 who arrived from Qusayr in just 10 days.

With nowhere to live, some refugees have set up makeshift shelters in the corners of the municipality courtyard, suspending blankets from trees to provide rudimentary privacy and shade.

"We have no money and no food," Jamila says. UN agencies and NGOs from Qatar, Denmark and Norway are trying to meet the needs of the refugees, but their work is "insufficient," municipal council member Wafiq Khalaf says, urging that tents be distributed.

Some residents have offered up empty rooms or buildings still under construction as temporary shelters.

One group of 17 people are living in a stairwell. In the next building, 30-year-old Mohammad has taken up residence in a garage with his three children, the eldest just five.

"Their mother was killed by a rocket on the road," he says sadly. A one-time member of the ruling Baath party, he speaks bitterly about his fate.

"For years, we used to sing 'Long live Bashar al-Assad' and this is how they repaid us."

In the municipality courtyard, a boyish-looking 18-year-old is covered in bandaged wounds that he says were sustained "in combat".

He fled Qusayr on foot, but insists he want to go back to Syria "in order to bring down the regime".

For other refugees, daily life and the struggle to survive are a greater priority. "There's nowhere to wash we've been homeless for seven days," sighs another, Rima.

She fled with her husband and their four children, including a baby just 10 months old, in a car. They say they were turned back at the border with Jordan before arriving in Lebanon by travelling through Damascus province.

The Arsal region shares some 55 kilometres (34 miles) of border with Syria, packed with illegal crossings used by those desperate to flee the violence that has killed more than 93,000 people.

Syrian aircraft have bombed the area many times, the regime arguing that it is "chasing down terrorists", its description for rebels

The flow of refugees shows no sign of slowing, with a truck carrying another 30 people arriving on Friday.

"May God make them suffer as they have made us suffer!" one woman cries as the vehicle pulls up.

It was not immediately clear who was behind the attack involving at least half a dozen mortar rounds, which came as Iran tallied ballot papers from Saturday's presidential election there.

"I can confirm that there was a deadly attack," Eliana Nabaa, spokeswoman for the United Nations mission in Iraq, told AFP. "We don't have the figures but yes, people were killed and injured."

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The report came as partial results from Friday's election gave a clear lead to moderate Hassan Rowhani, who headed Iran's nuclear negotiating team under reformist president Mohammad Khatami in the early 2000s and has pledged to engage more with the international community.

"We must toughen the sanctions against Iran and make this country understand that the military option remains on the table to halt the progress of its dangerous nuclear programme," the radio station quoted Yaalon as saying on a visit to the United States.

Asked about the presidential election, Yaalon replied: "It is (supreme leader Ayatollah) Ali Khamenei who will decide who gets elected."

A Pentagon statement confirmed that Yaalon discussed Iran in talks with Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel on Friday but gave few details.

Hagel and Yaalon "reaffirmed that the United States and Israel will continue to work together to counter threats posed by Iran and remain prepared for a range of contingencies," the statement said.

"The White House relied on fabricated information in order to hold the Syrian government responsible for using these weapons, despite a series of statements that confirmed that terrorist groups in Syria have chemical weapons," it said.

"The United States, in resorting to a shameful use of pretexts in order allow President Obama's decision to arm the Syrian opposition, shows that it has flagrant double standards in the way it deals with terrorism."

The Jerusalem Post said that plans to build 538 new homes in Itamar and legalise 137 existing units were submitted to regional planning authorities this week.