Spending time in areas controlled by terrorist organisations will become a criminal offence if an amendment to current legislation proposed by justice minister Ard van der Steur becomes law.

The planned change follows a motion in favour of the move backed by Van der Steur’s VVD, as well as the Christian Democrats and fundamentalist Christian SGP.

Since 2012, some 260 Dutch nationals have gone to war zones in Syria and Iraq. Around 40 have returned home and 42 are known to have died.

The minister said the public prosecution department considers the change to be a ‘valuable’ tool to prosecute people who have spent time in terrorist controlled areas but where there is insufficient evidence to prosecute them for terrorist offences.

He hopes to submit the amendment to parliament before the end of the year.