HAUNTING IMAGES: Children of Conflict

The heaviest price a nation pays for a war or conflict is the loss of innocence of generations of children.

While setbacks suffered in terms of damage and monetary losses can be cured over time, the emotional injuries inflicted on children by the ravages of war can never be healed.

Rediff.com brings you some haunting images of children -- often scarred but sometimes smiling -- from strife-torn regions across the world

A boy looks at what Palestinians say is a house damaged in an Israeli air strike in Gaza City November 11, 2012.

An Israeli air strike killed a Palestinian militant in the Hamas-governed Gaza Strip as a surge in cross-border violence entered its second day, local officials said. 

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A Syrian refugee girl carries bread as she walks to her tent on the Syrian side of the border with Turkey, near Idlib. Picture taken October 25, 2012.  

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Syrian boys walk shoulder to shoulder in the rain at the Boynuyogun refugee camp on the Turkish-Syrian border in Hatay province.

There are 1,750 Syrian refugees living in the camp which was set up by the Turkish Red Crescent. The Turkish foreign ministry says there are currently some 10,000 Syrian refugees living in six different camps in Turkey.

Picture taken February 8, 2012.

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A Bosnian Muslim boy cries near coffins prepared for a mass burial at the Memorial Center in Potocari, near Srebrenica July 9, 2012.

The bodies of 520 recently identified victims of the Srebrenica massacre will be buried on anniversary of the massacre, when Bosnian Serb forces commanded by Ratko Mladic slaughtered 8,000 Muslim men and boys and buried them in mass graves, in Europe's worst massacre since World War Two.

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A Libyan girl touches pictures of those who have been killed and who are missing since the conflict against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi began, at prayers near the courthouse in Benghazi April 15, 2011.

A fresh hail of government rockets crashed into Misrata after Western allies denounced a 'medieval siege' of the city and vowed to keep bombing Muammar Gaddafi's forces until he stepped down.

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Saja, an Iraqi girl injured during violence in her country, plays in a public park as part of  her treatment in Amman January 5, 2012.

French aid organisation Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) organised the visit to the park for Iraqi, Yemeni and Syrian children injured in violent conflicts in their home countries.

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Afghan girls wear burqas for fun as they play near their house in Kabul July 21, 2011.

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Victoria Chant weeps as the coffin of her father, British soldier Darren Chant, is carried out of the Guard's Chapel following his funeral in London December 1, 2009.

Warrant Officer Chant, Regimental Sergeant Major, 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards, was killed on duty in Afghanistan on November 3.  

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A child puts flowers on one of the 11, 541 red chairs along Titova street in Sarajevo, as the city marks the 20th anniversary of the start of the Bosnian war, April 6, 2012. 

The anniversary finds the Balkan country still deeply divided, power shared between Serbs, Croats and Muslims in a single state ruled by ethnic quotas and united by the weakest of central governments.

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Samira, 9, an Iraqi child who was injured during the Iraq war, poses for a picture during a visit to a children's museum in Amman August 20, 2009.

Samira has undergone multiple reconstructive surgeries and is one of dozens of Iraqi children that attend the daily therapy sessions run by the French aid organisation Medicins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders).

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Palestinians girls look out from the balcony of their damaged house in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip March 23, 2009.

An Israeli human rights group said the military violated medical ethics codes during its Gaza offensive, the latest accusation against the conduct in combat of Israel's military.

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A young Jewish settler holds a balloon during a parade celebrating the holiday of Purim in the West Bank city of Hebron March 10, 2009.

Purim is a celebration of the Jews' salvation from genocide in ancient Persia, as recounted in the Book of Esther. 

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War-displaced Mizelede mourns at the funeral of her grandfather, Leon Biliyo, 60, who died from malaria in Ngalima in northeastern Congo.

Thousands of Congolese have fled their villages since December as Lord's Resistance Army rebels roaming the bush carry out massacres that have killed some 900 civilians in two months.

Picture taken February 21, 2009.

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A boy walks past a pool of blood and scattered books at the entrance floor of a school after a mortar attack in Baghdad January 28, 2007.

Five female pupils were killed in a mortar strike on a secondary school in the predominantly Sunni Adil district of western Baghdad, the school principal told Reuters.

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Members of al Shabaab, Al Qaeda-linked insurgents, distribute relief to famine-stricken internally displaced people at Ala Yaasir camp 50 km away from Somalia's capital Mogadishu.

More than 800,000 Somalis are refugees, according to UN estimates, while up to 1.5 million are displaced within the Horn of Africa country.

Picture taken September 3, 2011.

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A tear runs down a boy's face as he lies on a bench after being treated for his injuries at the Lady Reading Hospital in Peshawar September 13, 2011.

Gunmen opened fire on a school bus in the Pakistani city of Peshawar, killing at least three children and the driver, a police official said.

Fifteen children were wounded, he said. The children on the bus were around nine years old.    

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A girl attends Friday prayers in front of an army tank in Tahrir Square in Cairo February 18, 2011.

Egyptians held a nationwide 'Victory March' to celebrate the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak's 30-year rule one week ago, to protect the revolution and to remind new military rulers of the power of the street.

Hundreds of thousands joined the rallies, which are also a memorial to the 365 people who died in the 18-day uprising, with many Egyptians expressing their intention to guard their newly-won prospect of democracy.

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A family member of a stampede victim cries with her child at a morgue in Karachi, September 14, 2009, where the bodies of women who perished in a stampede while collecting food items were being held.

Eighteen poor Pakistani women and children were killed in a stampede in the city of Karachi as they crowded into a building to collect flour and other supplies being handed out as charity, police said.  

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Eight-year-old Sumayya, whose uncle, Imran Ali, was injured in a shootout by unidentified gunmen, looks at him as he is brought to a hospital for treatment in Karachi August 23, 2011.

Karachi faced a complete shutdown after the Muttahida Qaumi Movement announced that a day of mourning would be observed against the ongoing wave of violence that has claimed nearly 100 lives in less than a week, local media reported.

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Palestinians are reflected in a puddle of blood mixed with water after an Israeli air strike in Gaza January 12, 2009.

Israeli troops fought fierce gun battles with Hamas fighters, keeping military pressure on the Islamist group while avoiding all-out urban warfare that would complicate ongoing diplomatic efforts to end the Gaza war.  

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A Palestinian schoolgirl walks past Israeli border police officers on her way home from school during clashes between Israeli troops and Palestinian stone-throwers in the Shuafat refugee camp in the West Bank near Jerusalem March 16, 2010.

Palestinians mounted violent protests in Jerusalem and President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy cancelled plans to return to the region as a US-Israeli crisis over Jewish settlement plans deepened.

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Somali children look at a Transitional Federal Government soldier carrying a belt of machine gun ammunition during patrol along the Indian Ocean coastline in Burgabo, south of Kismayu in Somalia December 14, 2011.

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A girl sits near debris left outside shops following a bomb explosion in Jamrud bazaar, about 25 km west of Peshawar in northwest Pakistan January 10, 2012. 

A bomb killed at least 23 people and wounded 26 on Tuesday when it exploded near a fuel station in Pakistan's northwestern Khyber region, one of the restive tribal areas where insurgents are battling government forces, regional officials said.

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A disabled Afghan girl exercises with her prosthetic legs at the Orthopedic Centre of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Kabul.

The free-of-charge centres log some 6,000 new patients every year, all of them Afghans.

Of those, 1,000 are direct victims of war, many grievously wounded by the heightened potency of bombs.

Picture taken April 11, 2012.

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A boy holds a bullet while attending a rally near the courthouse in Benghazi May 14, 2011.

The protesters were calling on the International Criminal Court to issue arrest warrants for Libya's leader Muammar Gaddafi.

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A boy flashes a victory sign as he mourns for his relative, a Libyan rebel fighter, who was killed during clashes with forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi during his funeral in the west Libyan city of Misrata June 19, 2011.