A Moscow student detained near Turkey's border with Syria will be released and brought home to Russia on Thursday, a news report said.
Varvara Karaulova, 19, was suspected of trying to cross into Syria to join the terrorist Islamic State, but her lawyer Alexander Karabanov said investigators on the case are currently treating her as a victim, Ekho Moskvy reported.
The philosophy student at Moscow State University flew to Istanbul on a one-way ticket in late May, following the common path for Russian recruits to the terrorist organization who travel to Turkey and then try to trek across the border with Syria.
Another young woman, Fatima Dzhamalova, a student at St. Petersburg's State Pediatric University, is also believed to have recently fled home to join the Islamic State, Fontanka news agency reported Wednesday. But Dzhamalova appeared to have changed her mind after arriving in Turkey, sending home text messages saying she regretted her move and asking for help, the report said.
Russian-speaking Islamiс radicals have been actively recruiting converts on social networks, posting travel instructions that seem designed to appeal to young people's sense of adventure, and love letters supposedly penned by militants to their wives.
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