Mariam Makhniashvili, 17, has been missing since Sept. 14. (Toronto Police)

The search for Mariam Makhniashvili has been expanded internationally to include a possible link with a religious sect from the Republic of Georgia.

Toronto Crime Stoppers has teamed up with Crime Stoppers International in the hope of finding clues to the missing teen.

Videos about Mariam are now posted on YouTube in both English and Georgian.

Her family hopes the expansion of the search will help to solve the case.

"In a sense it is absolutely unbearable and difficult. But in another sense we just have some hope still because we didn't find her body, because if she isn't found then she must be somewhere," said her father Vakhtang Makhniashvili.

The 17-year-old Grade 11 student disappeared after walking to Forest Hill Collegiate, near Bathurst Street and Eglinton Avenue West, on Sept. 14.

Toronto police are also investigating a possible link between a religious leader from the Republic of Georgia and Mariam's disappearance.

Vakhtang Makhniashvili said he first heard about a Georgian evangelical leader with links to Toronto on an internet forum. Georgians who live in Toronto were discussing it.

"First when I heard about him, I heard he was like, kind of [a] monster who would lure people and they would disappear without any trace," he said.

Makhniashvili says he passed the information to Toronto police.

Reports in the Georgian media recounted how a group of women left for Canada back in the mid-1990s with Rezo Bakradze, who was a university professor and head of a religious sect.

Roman Kutsia said he hasn't seen his daughter Natalia in 15 years. She was part of the group who left Georgia in 1994 to follow Bakradze — a man described as charismatic and highly intelligent.

"This man has enchanted our children. They all live in illusions. He forbids them to contact us. He's like an idol for them," said Kutsia, speaking through an interpreter during an interview with CBC News in Tblisi. Natalia Kutsia was one of the 35 students who left with Bakradze and lost touch with their families.

Some of the followers moved to Australia — others to Toronto.

Bakradze is also known as Teofile Malakia and videos posted on YouTube matching that name reveal a person who fuses Christian teachings with a pro-Russian emphasis in Georgian politics.

But a Georgian journalist, Goderdzi Sharashia, who has covered the Bakradze story says the Makhniashvili case doesn't appear to be the same.

He said in a telephone interview from Tblisi that Bakradze's motives in 1994 were religious and that when the group left Georgia they said they were leaving to find work.

It's also not clear if Bakradze or his followers are still in Toronto.

Vakhtang Makhniashvili says he's not convinced there's a link between Bakradze and Mariam because those involved in the 1990s episode were adults and religious followers. "We don't go to his church or evangelical church," said Makhniashvili.

Toronto police say they are investigating and will follow up on any lead.

They've taken the Makhniashvili family's computer for examination. The family has also given police Mariam's passwords for her email and Facebook accounts.