The public prosecution department is going to do more to take legal action against Dutch jihadi suspects while they are still in Syria and Iraq, the Volkskrant said on Thursday.

In total, officials are working on 190 cases, including women and children and people who have been declared dead on social media, the paper said.

By starting investigations early enough, it will be easier to separate people into those who really regret their involvement and those who have become hardened jihadis, spokesman Ferry van Veghel said. It will also allow people to be jailed immediately on their return.

In March and April, 12 cases will come to court involving Dutch nationals who are still in IS-held territory. Last year, four men were sentenced to six years in jail in absentia for joining Islamic terror groups in Syria and Iraq and planning to carry out terrorist attacks. One of the four was thought to be dead.

‘Our policy is now to take a more systematic approach to taking action against people who are in war zones, people who we don’t think we should wait with prosecuting,’ a spokesman told news agency ANP.

Risks

MPs are due to debate the risk posed by returning jihadis next week, following the publication of a report by the AIVD security service. That report said more jihadis are expected to return to the Netherlands now that IS is losing ground.

This new group is expected to be more dangerous that previous returnees because they were in IS territory for longer, have been trained in the use of weapons, have been involved in actual fighting and have jihadi networks.

The AIVD also warned about the risk posed by children, some as young as nine, who have had military training.

Some 280 Dutch jihadis are known to have gone to Iraq and Syria and around 50 have returned home. It is not clear if these figures include women and children.