ANKARA
The authorities in Austria have detained two teenage girls after claims they tried to travel to Syria to marry fighters from the extremist Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant militia.
Salzburg prosecutors said on Sunday that investigations began after the Romanian authorities stopped the girls on a train on Dec. 30 as they tried to travel to Syria. The duo’s identities have not been made public.
One of the girl’s parents turned her phone over to the police after she went missing. Austrian police were able to recover data from a Russian chat application which revealed conversations about her plans, according to Salzburg prosecutors.
A spokesperson for the Austrian authorities said that one of the girls has been charged with recruiting potential wives for the ISIL extremists.
In October 2014, the Austrian authorities detained a 14-year-old boy who was planning to travel to Syria to join terror organizations and had earlier learned how to build bombs through the Internet.
According to Austria's interior minister over 170 people from Eastern Europe have traveled to the Middle East to joint militant groups.
A report from the UN Security Council published in October 2014 has claimed that more than 15,000 foreigners have traveled to Syria and Iraq to join ISIL and other terror groups.
