TWO of the photographs accompanying this story today profoundly affected me because of the intense tragedy that they portrayed.
Yet sadly they’re everyday images from the world around us, vividly and tragically displayed in an exclusive exhibition called War-Torn Children which is on view in Belfast’s Linen Hall Library until mid-April.
The photographs are heartrending, harrowing and haunting, chosen at random from an intensely sad selection of scenes collectively described by the Linen Hall’s Rachel Wetherall as “a close-up view of the refugee crises.”
Along with the main exhibition there are a number of ‘side-shows’ on the same tragic theme, and various other complementary events and displays which are outlined in detail on the library’s website at www.linenhall.com
Rachel told me “the photographs expose the ugly consequences of war on children.
The images are powerful, emotional and deeply disturbing.”
We’ve all seen similar images before - regularly.
And there’ll be more tomorrow, and the day after, as we peruse newspapers and websites, or news-hop between our mobile phones, radio sets and television screens.
I sometimes wonder - how many more photographs until there are no children left to photograph?
The images that are reproduced here today show Zaatari refugee camp in Jordan in 2013 and a Mediterranean rescue operation in 2015.
The former focuses from above on a densely-crowded camp, heaving with over 80,000 homeless Syrians packed together in huts and tents in what used to be the Jordanian desert but is now the fourth largest ‘city’ in Jordan.
Approximately 80 babies are born here every day.
Babies ‘on the run’ from war.
There are ‘public services’, hospitals, mosques and mod cons and there’s even a pizza delivery service within the vast expanse of the camp, but schooling, if available, is often difficult, and although the refugees are safe from the effects of direct conflict, there are high numbers of cases of sexual violence and rape.
Basic amenities come at hugely inflated prices and very young girls are often ‘married off’ to secure a dowry to purchase everyday necessities.
According to United Nations estimations, it takes an average of 17 years for refugees fleeing on-going conflicts to return home.
Another Linen Hall photograph reproduced here today is entitled Open Arms.
It is the terrified little baby’s arms that are opened outwards, towards a world that regularly sees photographs like this.
Last year a child lay dead on a Turkish beach and on countless millions of our front pages and television screens.
That tiny, lonely, lifeless, migrant toddler was washed up, waterlogged and bedraggled, face-down in the Mediterranean sun-seekers’ sand and surf. 
Today’s toddler-picture from the Linen Hall exhibition was photographed in Lesbos, Greece, in 2015. The little, clasped, outstretched hands and tiny fingers are in vivid contrast to the aid worker’s strong, muscled arms gently enfolding the anguished baby.
Alongside the photographs are a number of complementary events and displays similarly depicting the devastating effects of war on children. 
The panic, fear and terrifying repercussions of conflict on innocent youngsters is also expressed in the Linen Hall in a collection of intricately stitched arpilleras - three dimensional textiles - and in posters, newspaper articles, books and letters. The colourful and expressive arpilleras and wall hangings, originating from South America and Europe, uncover the raw emotions and consequences endured by children caught in the centre, and on the fringes, of wars, both historical and currently on-going. Themes include genocide, landmines, incarceration, displacement and starvation. War-Torn Children is curated by Roberta Bacic, a lecturer, researcher and human rights advocate.
Roberta outlined the objectives of the hugely moving exhibition - “The pain and horror suffered by children trapped by wars - not waged by them - empowers us to bear witness and explore through textile language, as well as via photos, posters and other memorabilia, what we can still do. We want to highlight not only the horrors but also the resilience amidst conflict.”
There’s substantial local input to the War-Torn Children exhibition too.
Irene MacWilliams, from Northern Ireland, was compelled to create her arpillera entitled ‘Children on the Edge’ after seeing “a picture in a newspaper of a starving and dying child hunched up on the ground, the vultures in the trees above were waiting for it to die.”
And there is a selection of letters on display that were sent by students of Gort Convent primary school, Galway, and Beneavin de la Salle College, Finglas, Dublin, to non-violent peace activist Margaretta D’Arcy during her imprisonment in 2014 for anti-war campaigning.War-Torn Children runs until Saturday. April 15. The exhibition is free to visit. For full information go to www.linenhall.com.