Two teenage girls who fled their Austrian homes to join Islamic State (IS) have told their families they want to come home after marrying jihadists and falling pregnant.
Sabina Selimovic, 15, and Samra Kesinovic, 17, left for Syria in April but appear to have become disillusioned with their strict Islamic lifestyle.
Austrian officials have talked to the girls about coming home but the country's laws against jihadists returning are blocking their way.
Sabina Selimovic, 15, and Samra Kesinovic, 17
They also worry they are irrecoverably linked to IS who are known for their brutal beheadings and intolerance of anyone who doesn't adhere tho their strict fundamentalist world view.
A spokesperson for the Austrian interior ministry, Karl-Heinz Grundboeck, said: "The main problem is about people coming back to Austria.
SEE ALSO:
"Once they leave it is almost impossible."
Selimovic with armed men
The two became "poster girls" for the militant movement with pictures posted on social media showing them in full-length burkas with armed men.
A note left behind by the girls for their families said: "Don’t look for us. We will serve Allah — and we will die for him."
They are believed to have become radicalised by reading jihadi literature on the internet and attending a local mosque in Vienna.
Selimovic and Kesinovic posted this photo to social media
Peter Slanar, the headmaster of the school the teenagers attended, told The Express: "I would have said a year ago that they were perfectly normal teenage girls, but then the older, Samra, started sending pictures of herself in the Muslim headscarf to fellow pupils and was trying to convert everybody to her point of view.
"There were vandalism incidents in which tables and walls had the words 'I love Al Qaeda' written on them.
"We had to act when they started saying that America was to blame for the September 11 attack. That was simply going too far."
Last month it was reported a number of jihadist fighters from the UK wanted to leave IS and return home.
The men told Professor Peter Neumann of King's College that they regret their decision after becoming frustrated that rival rebel groups are fighting among themselves, instead of targeting President Assad’s forces.
Profiles on Interpol of the two teenagers who went missing in April
Professor Neumann told the Times newspaper they have been in contact with a number of British jihadis who want to come back to the UK but feel they cannot do so for fear they will be jailed.
“We came to fight the regime and instead we are involved in gang warfare. It’s not what we came for but if we go back [to Britain] we will go to jail,” one jihadist, claiming to represent 30 others, told researchers.
He said the Government should set up a "de-radicalisation programme" for those willing former jihadis, echoing calls by Labour leader Ed Miliband who last month suggested a mandatory programme of de-radicalisation for those involved on the fringes with Islamic State (IS).