A South Korean teen, who mysteriously went missing in Turkey, is suspected to have joined the Islamic State.
The 18-year old middle school dropout had arrived in Turkey, earlier this month, along with a family friend after persuading his parents to allow him to travel this far to meet one of his online friends.
The teen was reportedly staying in the Turkish city of Kilis.
The worried parents of the teenager, who has been identified by his last name "Kim", contacted the Seoul Police after their son disappeared from the hotel. Investigations revealed that the youngster had posted many messages on social networking site of Twitter expressing his wish to join the jihadist group.
The police found that the youth was using a Twitter account by the name of "Sunni Mujahideen" and had tried to reach out to ISIS on several occasions. In many of his Twitter messages posted in October, last year, Kim wrote: "How to join IS [Islamic State]? Does anyone know? I want to join IS."
The investigators now believe that the 18-year-old may have crossed into Syria as the hotel he was staying in was very close to the Syrian border.
"Many materials suggest that he was greatly interested in IS, but we cannot confirm whether he has joined them", Chung Jae-Il, a senior Seoul police officer, told AFP [via Channel NewsAsia].
If this turns out to be true, it would be the first known case of a South Korean national enlisting with the Islamic radical group.
The CCTV footages found by the Turkish Police show Kim boarding an unlicensed cab with an unidentified man from a mosque near the hotel.
The Turkish Police said the two passengers were dropped near a refugee camp in Besiriye village, which is 18 km south-east from Kilis and 5 km from Syria.
