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The remains of a mother aged 34 and her young daughter, 10 have been located inside freezing appliances in an flat in western Austria.

The victims, a Syrian woman and her daughter, who had been missing for a number of months, were detected on Friday. The cooling units were concealed behind a plasterboard wall in the apartment, situated in the Innsbruck area.

Two men, a Austrian man, 55 and his brother aged 53, were arrested in the month of June. The elder brother, a colleague of the female victim, told police last week that there had been an accident—but rejected murder.

Informing journalists recently, a spokesman for the state prosecutor announced the brothers were being detained on "strong suspicion of murder".

Personal details of those implicated have not been disclosed by police, in compliance with Austrian law.

Their going missing was initially flagged by the female victim's relative, who resides in Germany, on July 25, 2024.

Investigators revealed the 55-year-old suspect told them at the time she had embarked on an extended trip with her daughter to see her family in Turkey.

The mother's debit card was then discovered to be utilized in foreign locations repeatedly.

Yet when police examined the mother's apartment, her smartphone was discovered.

Someone also claimed hearing a loud noise in the dwelling, and shouts of "mum" on the date the pair were thought to have disappeared.

A wider official inquiry was started, with authorities finding various messages originating from the woman's phone—such as a job termination message to her workplace and communications to the male colleague.

Law enforcement said a four-figure sum was also moved to the suspect.

The head of the State Criminal Police Office informed the press on that day that a storage facility had been leased before the vanishing and a cooling unit had been placed there.

The brothers removed the cooling unit from the unit on the date the victims vanished, Tersch said. And a seven days after, they acquired another freezer.

Officials believe they believe this points to the deaths were intentionally orchestrated.

"The cause of death remains unclear due to the advanced decay of the bodies," she stated.

The prosecutor's spokesman—from the legal authorities—stated the specific order of occurrences is not yet known, but the victims were carefully placed and were not found during a prior examination.

Although the men were arrested in the summer, it was only on November 12 that the 55-year-old admitted to an event and to concealing the remains. He rejects any plan to cause death, authorities said.

In a related development, his 53-year-old sibling admitted to a concealment but rejected knowledge of a homicide.

The two suspects are presently in pre-trial detention in jails in separate locations, approximately 189 kilometers away from each other.

Via a shared communication, the nation's official for women's affairs and the top legal representative declared the "reported homicide of mother and child... constitutes the abrupt and violent termination of a mother and child and uncovers a cruel system".

"Women and girls are being killed due to the sole reason that they are women and girls," they added.

"Gender-based killings are a strongly established and issue affecting all of society that we must address decisively."