HAUNTING IMAGES: Children of Conflict - Part II

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 the second part of our series on haunting images of children -- often scarred but sometimes smiling -- from strife-torn regions across the world

Read Part I : Children of Conflict

Syrian refugees gesture to photographers at a refugee camp in the Turkish border town of Boynuyogun in Hatay province June 29, 2011.

The words 'Leave, you butcher!' are written on the abdomen of a toddler. 

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Khetam, an Iraqi refugee girl who was injured during the violence in her country, wears a face mask as she reads a book during a psychological therapy session in Amman October 11, 2012.

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

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Israelis sit inside a sewage pipe used as shelter during an air alert in the southern community of Nitzan, near Ashdod November 15, 2012.

A Hamas rocket killed three Israelis north of the Gaza Strip, drawing the first blood from Israel as the Palestinian death toll rose to 15, in a military showdown lurching closer to all-out war and an invasion of the enclave.

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An Israeli girl stands outside a sewage pipe used as shelter after an air raid siren, warning of incoming rockets, in the southern community of Nitzan, near Ashdod November 15, 2012.

A Hamas rocket killed three Israelis north of the Gaza Strip, drawing the first blood from Israel as the Palestinian death toll rose to 15, in a military showdown lurching closer to all-out war and an invasion of the enclave.

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An Israeli boy sits next to a piano as he prepares to sleep in a bomb shelter in the southern town of Netivot November 14, 2012.

Israel launched a major offensive against Palestinian militants in Gaza, killing the military commander of Hamas in an air strike and threatening an invasion of the enclave that the Islamist group vowed would "open the gates of hell".

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Afghan residents sit on the ground near a US Army soldier of PRT Laghman, 1st Battalion, 143 Airborne Infantry securing the perimeter of a government building in Laghman province, Afghanistan March 25, 2012.

Dozens of former insurgents and their families took part in a graduation ceremony on Sunday after finishing various livelihood training workshops given to them by the Laghman provincial government and the US military.      

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Sawssan Abdelwahab, who fled Idlib in Syria, walks with her children outside the refugee camp near the Turkish-Syrian border in the southeastern city of Yayladagi February 16, 2012.

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Afghan boys stand in front of a US Marine from India Company, 3rd Battalion 4th Marines, as he patrols in the small town of Delaram in Nimroz province, southern Afghanistan January 10, 2010.

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A male student sits beside female students as they play clarinets at the Kabul Music Academy.

In Afghanistan's sole music academy, students learn how to play traditional and western instruments as part of a government initiative to relieve the pains of decades of war through music.

Despite a rich musical legacy, Afghanistan's melodic development has been severely disrupted by years of war and outright banned during the austere rule of the Taliban.

At the Afghanistan National Institute of Music, orphans learn how to sing and play instruments alongside talented promising musicians who are selected on merit. 

Picture taken January 7, 2012.

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British Army Major Jamie Murray of the 2nd Battalion, The Royal Gurkha Rifles, shows his rifle to Afghan children during a patrol outside Checkpoint Tander near the town of Lashkar Gah in Helmand province, southern Afghanistan.

Picture taken July 14, 2011. 

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Captain Michael Harris, commander of US Army's Alpha Company, 1st Battalion of 32nd Infantry Regiment, speaks with an Afghan family during a patrol near Nawapass village, Kunar province, eastern Afghanistan February 6, 2009.  

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A girl walks past policemen patrolling the Rocinha Slum during an operation to find a man who killed a policeman during a shootout at one of the slum's alleys in Rio de Janeiro April 4, 2012.

According to local media, nine people were killed in Rocinha in two months during a dispute on the control of the drug traffic.

Three thousand troops, backed by helicopters and armored vehicles, occupied Rio de Janeiro's largest slum without firing a shot on November 13, the biggest step in the Brazilian city's bid to improve security and end the reign of drug gangs.

The occupation of Rocinha, a notorious hillside favela that overlooks some of Rio's swankiest areas, is a crucial part of the city's preparations to host soccer's World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics two years later. 

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Children look at a puddle of blood at a crime scene in Ciudad Juarez November 4, 2011.

A man was shot dead by hitmen while standing outside a kindergarten, according to local media.   

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Children dressed in Halloween costumes look at a crime scene in a neighbourhood in Ciudad Juarez October 31, 2011.

A municipal police officer and his mother were shot dead at her house by a group of hitmen, according to local media 

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A child stands in front of a bullet-riddled wall of her home, damaged during fighting between pro and anti-Gaddafi fighters, after her family returned to Sirte October 26, 2011.

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A boy holds a Palestinian flag as Israeli soldiers block the road during a protest in the West Bank city of Hebron, February 6, 2009.

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A Palestinian boy plays with a soccer ball in front of a destroyed house on the outskirts of Jabalya in the northern Gaza Strip January 19, 2009, after Israel's offensive in Gaza. 

More Israeli forces left the Gaza Strip after a 22-day assault on Hamas militants, and both sides kept a ceasefire, allowing dazed Palestinians to survey the destruction and mourn their dead.

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A Palestinian boy holds a toy weapon as Israeli police stand guard during prayers in the Ras al-Amud neighbourhood of Arab East Jerusalem January 23, 2009.

Israel had informed Muslim worshippers that access to the compound, known to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif, and to Jews as Temple Mount, would be limited due to security concerns.  

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A boy displaced with his family by fighting in Misrata holds empty ammunition shells as he plays war games at a special  school May 25, 2011. 

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Children stand at a damaged area, which the Libyan government said was from a coalition air strike, at the house of Saif Al-Arab Gaddafi, son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, in Tripoli May 1, 2011.

Libya said on Sunday Muammar Gaddafi's youngest son Saif Al-Arab and three grandchildren were killed in a NATO air strike and Britain said that while it was not targeting the leader, it was homing in on his military machine.

Libyan government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim said Gaddafi was unharmed and in good health despite what he called "a direct operation to assassinate the leader of this country".

The deaths have not been independently confirmed.

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A rebel fighter escorts his son away from the front line at the western entrance of Ajdabiyah April 12, 2011.

Forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi bombarded the western entrance to the rebel-held town of Ajdabiyah in eastern Libya on Tuesday.  

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An Iraqi boy is taken away from a suspected militant, who has been accused of killing his father at the height of the sectarian slaughter in 2006-07, during a presentation to the media at the interior ministry in Baghdad November 21, 2011.

A total of 22 suspected militants were presented to the media as they await their trial, according to the police.

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A US soldier lifts a girl while standing guard during the distribution of wheelchairs by US and Iraqi security forces for needy children at al-Fadhil clinic in Baghdad April 14, 2009.  

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School boys cover their ears as they sit in a corner during clashes in Baghdad's Sadr City.

Picture taken April 15, 2008.  

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An Iraqi girl offers water to soldiers of the Iraqi army elite mobile 3rd Brigade 1st Division as they search her house during a joint operation with US Marines in Huseiniya, near Baghdad July 8, 2008.

Security talks between the United States and Iraq to permit US forces to stay in Iraq beyond 2008 are not aimed at setting a hard deadline for withdrawal, a White House spokesman said.

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