At least six young Canadian men and women from Montreal and its suburbs traveled overseas last month to join the Islamic State group, local media reported Thursday.

Some of them, including two young women, were students at Montreal CEGEP College de Maisonneuve.

Danny Jano, an Assyrian Christian, fled with his family in their pyjamas when they heard that Islamic State group jihadists were approaching their home in northeast Syria.

"It was the longest and most difficult five hours of my life," he said by telephone from the provincial capital Hasakeh where they took refuge.

After fighting with rebels in Libya and embracing the revolt in Syria, Matthew VanDyke has rolled up in northern Iraq, but the celebrity American revolutionary-cum-filmmaker has traded his fatigues for a three-piece suit.

VanDyke, who rose to fame as a foreign fighter backing Libyan rebels against Moammar Gadhafi, has just finished leading his new military contracting firm through its first assignment -- training Christian volunteers to take on jihadists.

U.N. peace envoy Staffan de Mistura will travel to Syria on Saturday for talks on his plan to halt fighting in the northern city of Aleppo, the U.N. spokesman said.

"He will be heading to Damascus on Saturday to meet with senior Syrian government officials to follow up, obviously, on the cessation of hostilities and to have further consultations," Stephane Dujarric said Thursday.

France's president and prime minister on Thursday slammed a decision by three lawmakers to meet with Syria's Bashar Assad, who they described as a "butcher" and "dictator."

A multi-party group of four lawmakers made a trip to Syrian capital Damascus on Wednesday and met with senior ministers. Three of them -- excluding one from the ruling Socialist party -- met with Assad.

The U.S.-led coalition carried out air strikes Thursday against the Islamic State group in northeastern Syria, where the jihadists have launched a new offensive and kidnapped 220 Assyrian Christians.

The raids struck areas around the town of Tal Tamr in Hasakeh province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, without giving information on possible casualties.

The Obama administration's commitment to take in potentially thousands of Syrian refugees is raising national security concerns among law enforcement officials and some congressional Republicans who fear clandestine radicals could slip into the country among the displaced.

The administration has vowed to help those who fled the civil war by providing homes, furniture, English classes and job training in the United States. It says they'll be subject to intensive screening before entering the country, and that the overwhelming majority are vulnerable women and children.

Security forces are pursuing a Lebanese Christian who is allegedly affiliated with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), fearing that he might be used to carry out a dangerous terrorist act in Lebanon.

According to As Safir newspaper published on Thursday, security forces called the 28-year-old outlaw “Jack”.

A worrying number of Australian women are heading to Iraq and Syria to become so-called Islamic State group "jihadi brides", Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said Thursday, warning against notions of a "romantic adventure".

At least 110 Australians have left to fight alongside militants in the Middle East and security officials said between 30 and 40 women were among them or were actively supporting the group in Australia.

The United States and Iran have a "mutual interest" in defeating the Islamic State group but the long-time foes are not cooperating to do so, Secretary of State John Kerry said Wednesday.

"They are totally opposed to ISIL and they are in fact taking on and fighting and eliminating ISIL members along the Iraqi border near Iran and have serious concerns about what that would do to the region," Kerry told lawmakers, referring to IS by another acronym.