(CNN) Omran Daqneesh, the boy whose bloodied, dusty face became the image suffering in rebel-held Aleppo, is once again appearing on video clips being shared worldwide.
This time, he appears fresh-faced, his hair neatly brushed, in interviews filmed by pro-Syrian government news agencies, and aired in countries that back the Syrian regime. Pro-Syrian channels from Lebanon, Russia and Iran joined Syrian media for the interviews.
In one interview, Omran's father Mohammed accuses rebel groups and international media of using the bloodied photos of his son as propaganda tools.
"We were very harmed because of the gunmen and how they used things to their benefit with my child," he told Ruptly, a video news agency owned by Kremlin-backed news channel Russia Today.
"Thank god, he was only slightly wounded. Thank god after the army advanced and retook these areas; we are now back in our homes. The situation now is very good, thank god."
It's not known if Daqneesh or his father gave the interviews under duress, but the Syrian government is known to keep tight control on information within the country.
The image of Omran Daqneesh taken last August (left), and how he appeared in Syrian TV interviews.
Pro-opposition journalist Musa Omar said that Daqneesh was speaking to the cameras under duress.
"Please don't say anything about Omran's father, he is not pro-regime," he said. "He is a hostage, he is a prisoner under the regime control, forced to say every single word in this interview."
'Face of Aleppo'
Omran caught the world's attention when he was filmed, dazed, sitting in an ambulance after being pulled from the rubble of his family's home last August, after an apparent regime or Russian airstrike.
He is silent despite the cacophony around him, and reaches up to touch his bloodied temple. He pulls his hand away, sticky with blood, and looks at it uncomprehendingly.
"He was in extreme shock," a spokesman for the Aleppo Media Center, an activist group, said at the time. He was taken to hospital but released shortly after.
Rescue workers at the time said several other people were killed and many more wounded by the airstrike, including women and children. Omran's 10-year-old brother Ali was among the dead.
His name is Omran: The bloodied boy in Syria
This still image, taken from a
video posted by the Aleppo Media Center, shows a young boy in an ambulance after an airstrike in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo on Wednesday, August 17. The boy has been identified as Omran Daqneesh, and the video of him has been circulating on social media.
A civil defense worker carries Omran into the ambulance. The airstrike destroyed Omran's home, where he lived with his parents and two siblings. Director of the Aleppo Media Center Yousef Saddiq said Omran's 10-year-old brother, Ali,
died from his injuries on Saturday, August 20.
Syria is now in its fifth year of civil war, with the
Syrian Center for Policy Research estimating the death toll at a staggering 470,000. Aleppo may be one of the hardest-hit cities. Mustafa al Sarouq, the cameraman who filmed the video of Omran,
told CNN's Nima Elbagir: "The truth is that the image you see today is repeated every day in Aleppo."
The bloodied boy sits and waits for medical attention. An Aleppo Media Center activist
told CNN that Omran did not cry at any point during the rescue and appeared to be in extreme shock.
It took nearly an hour to dig Omran out from underneath the rubble, an activist told CNN. He and other rescuers used flashlights to bring out several people trapped beneath the bombed-out building.
Omran silently wipes blood from his head in one of the last images we see in the video. He has since been released from the hospital. The doctor who treated him said his injury was light compared with the others wounded in the bombing.
Father: 'I love my country'
In one interview aired Tuesday, Omran's father Daqneesh moved to distance himself from the Syrian Civil Defense units who had taken his children to hospital.
"They took (my kids) out and started filming them, while I was still upstairs.
"They filmed them and took them to the hospital. When I came down and asked about my kids, they told me they were taken to the hospital."
Daqneesh told Syrian state media Sama that the rebel commander had offered him safe passage to Turkey in return for denouncing the Syrian regime and blaming the attack on his home on the Russians.
"The rebel commander, Mohammed al Fatteh, came to visit me upon request from the Turkish Prime Minister... to (invite me to) go to Turkey. He said they would secure me a job, a house and grant me citizenship. They would even take me in an armored vehicle... but I refused," he said.
When asked why he didn't accept the offer, he said: "Because I love my country and I am not convinced of them. (The rebels) are ridiculous."
Sama journalist Kinana Allouche posted images of her interview with the family, including Omran, on her Facebook page.
"Omran the child, who the (media) tried to cover up the real cause of his injuries, claiming that it was a result of the Syrian Arab Army.
"Now he lives in the Syrian state with its army, its leader and its people."
Iranian journalist, Hosein Mortada also posted video of the family, saying that Syrian Civil Defense units, also known as the White Helmets, "claimed to save him from death."
Story of little Syrian boy moves CNN anchor to tears
Government control
The Syrian regime regained full control of Aleppo in December of last year, marking a major turning point in the country's five-year civil war.
The battle for Aleppo in 20 photos
A Syrian man reacts while standing on the rubble of his house while others look for survivors and bodies in the Tariq al-Bab district of the northern city of Aleppo on February 23, 2013.
A Free Syrian Army fighter aims his weapon during clashes with government forces in Aleppo on Tuesday, January 15, 2013.
A member of the Syrian pro-government forces stands amid heavily damaged buildings in Aleppo's 1070 district on November 8, 2016, after troops seized it from rebel fighters.
A wounded Syrian boy cries after bombs fell on the opposition-controlled Firdevs neighborhood in Aleppo on October 11, 2016.
Smoke rises after a bomb explodes in a residential area in the Darat Izza neighborhood of Aleppo on October 4, 2016.
Search and rescue team members carry an injured man after Syrian regime airstrikes targeted the Meshed neighborhood of Aleppo on July 21, 2016.
A rebel fighter aims his weapon toward Syrian government forces' positions at the Menagh military airport near Aleppo on March 13, 2013.
The body of a Syrian army soldier lies on the ground after heavy clashes with government forces at a military academy besieged by the rebels in Tal Sheer village, north of Aleppo, on December 16, 2012.
Debris covers a street and flames rise from a building after a reported airstrike by Syrian government forces on March 7, 2014, during the Friday prayer in the Sukkari neighborhood of Aleppo.
Wounded 5-year-old
Omran Daqneesh sits alone in the back of an ambulance after he was injured during a Russian or Assad regime forces airstrike targeting the Qaterji neighborhood of Aleppo on August 17, 2016.
A Syrian opposition tank fires a rocket toward an Assad forces' building during clashes near the Air Intelligence building of Jamiat al-Zahra, Aleppo, on April 13, 2015.
On September 7, 2012, Free Syrian Army fighters run after attacking a Syrian army tank during fighting in the Izaa district of Aleppo.
Search and rescue team members inspect collapsed buildings after Assad regime forces attacked residential areas in the Karm al-Beik region of Aleppo on July 9, 2015.
Syrian civil defense volunteers and rescuers remove a baby from under the rubble of a destroyed building after a reported airstrike on the rebel-held neighborhood of al-Kalasa in Aleppo on April 28, 2016.
A Free Syrian Army fighter takes cover during clashes with Syrian army soldiers in the Salaheddine neighborhood of central Aleppo on August 7, 2012.
Syrian pro-government forces walk in the damaged ancient Umayyad Mosque in the old city of Aleppo on December 13, 2016, after they captured the area.
A man in front of a field hospital mourns the death of his relatives on August 21, 2012, in Aleppo.
Rubble is seen in the Salaheddine neighborhood on March 24, 2013, in Aleppo.
Syrian government forces walk in the strategic area of the Bazo hilltop, on the southern outskirts of Aleppo, as they advance to seize the rebel-held eastern part of the city on October 25, 2016.
An aerial view shows a convoy of buses and ambulances waiting at a crossing point in the Amiriyah district of Aleppo on December 15, 2016, to evacuate civilians trying to flee from areas under siege by Iran-led Shiite militias and Assad regime forces.
Aleppo: Five years to ruins
President Bashar al-Assad's troops and supporting militias entered eastern Aleppo by ground in late November. The regime and Russia -- its most powerful ally -- decimated neighborhoods with airstrikes, leaving scorched earth where a bustling metropolis once stood.
Tens of thousands of eastern Aleppo's residents went to rebel-held areas in the countryside, according to a UN report. Very few chose to go to western Aleppo, said Jan Egeland, UN senior adviser on Syria. But Omran's family was among those that did.