Children of Syria: Childhood lost in violence and conflict

It has been more than two years since the Syrian civil war broke out. Scores of people have lost their lives in this bloody conflict, but the most badly affected have been the children. Rights group even claim of detention and torture of children at the hands of the Syrian security forces.

What must life be for hundreds of children caught in this mad violence? Perhaps, we'll never fully know, but here are a few stirring images that tell the story of the children of conflict.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

Children walk along a damaged street filled with debris in Deir al-Zor.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A girl wearing a pink scarf flees with her family from shelling in the al-Masir area in Aleppo.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A man carries a child who was wounded after a jet missile hit the al-Myassar neighbourhood of Aleppo. The Arabic graffiti on the wall reads, "God is great". 

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A wounded child sits on a stretcher as he is treated in a temporary medical center after he was injured during a shelling by forces loyal to President Bashar al Assad, in Aleppo. The graffiti behind reads: "Liberate Meng (area)".

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A girl looks up to the sky after hearing the sound of shelling as she sits on a toy pony in the playground of Al-Tawheed school in Aleppo.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A girl sits on a chair placed among rubble as she sells bread on a damaged street in Deir al-Zor

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A boy drinks water from a burst water pipe in Aleppo's Karm al-Jabal district.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

Children warm themselves around a fire during cold weather in Aleppo.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

Children look out from their windows in Aleppo.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A woman and her children make their way through rubble and garbage along a street in Deir al-Zor

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A Syrian family cross to Turkey by boat over the Orontes river on the Turkish-Syrian border near the village of Hacipasa in Hatay province.

Scores of Syrian civilians, many of them women with screaming children clinging to their necks, crossed Orontes, a narrow river marking the border with Turkey as they fled the fighting in Azmarin and surrounding villages. Residents from the Turkish village of Hacipasa, nestled among olive groves, helped pull them across in small metal boats.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

Girls queue to buy bread at the only bakery serving the outskirts of Idlib province.

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A boy makes preparations in a cave under his house to be used as a shelter in Kafruma, an area in the province of Idlib. 

Click NEXT to see more PHOTOS...

A Syrian refugee girl writes "we miss Syria too much" on the chalkboard in her classroom in Majdel Anjar in Bekaa Valley.

...