Austria's potential forced deportation of Syrian refugees back to their changed homeland can only occur when it is safe, Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg told Reuters, adding that it was impossible to predict timings.

Migrants queue up for buses after they arrived at the border between Austria and Hungary about 180 kms (110 miles) south of Vienna, Austria, Saturday, Sept. 19, 2015.

Jens Spahn, a senior member of Germany’s opposition Christian Democrats ( cdu ), suggested handing €1,000 ($1,050) to any Syrian who wished to go home. Austria’s government even instructed officials to prepare deportation plans.

While governments urge caution, calls are rising across Europe for Syrians who fled the Assad regime to return.

Najem al-Moussa was delighted when news of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's overthrow first beamed from the television in his tiny Athens apartment. Then came a dreaded thought: what if Assad's fall meant he and his family would be forced to return to the devastated country they had fled nine years before?