Austin Tice's mother hopeful new US, Syria administrations will help find him

By Jana Choukeir

DUBAI (Reuters) - The mother of American journalist Austin Tice said on Monday she was hopeful that the new administrations in the U.S. and Syria would help her find her missing son, who was taken captive during a reporting trip near Damascus about 12 years ago.

"Today, January 20, President (Donald) Trump will be sworn into office and I have great hope that his administration will work to bring Austin home," Debra Tice told a press conference in Damascus organized by the NGO Hostage Aid Worldwide.

She also said she was encouraged because officials in the new U.S. government had already reached out to her about her missing son.

Tice has criticised outgoing U.S. President Joe Biden's administration, saying they did not negotiate hard enough for her son's release, even in recent months.

Tice, who worked as a freelance reporter for the Washington Post and other publications, was one of the first U.S. journalists to make it into Syria after the outbreak of the civil war in 2011.

She visited in 2015 to meet Syrian authorities about her son, before they stopped granting her visas.

The overthrow of veteran leader Bashar al-Assad in December by Syrian rebels has allowed her to visit again from her home in Texas.

Tice added that on Sunday she met Syria's new leaders, who she said demonstrated a "dedication" to bring her son back. "The new administration knows what we're going through and they're trying to make things right for people like us," she said.

However, Tice said that the ousting of Assad on Dec. 8 had complicated the search for her son, as it made it more difficult to know where her son is held and by whom.

"It's like we've reached the beginning again," she said.

"It was more than 12 years ago that I haven't been able to see him or talk to him but I know he's here. Austin if you can somehow hear this I love you. I know you're not giving up and neither am I," she added.

The U.S. State Department last week said there is no U.S. government organization currently on the ground in Syria to take part in the search for Tice.

Tice had been the subject of a large-scale search following the ousting of Assad after 13 years of civil war in December.

U.S. officials have expressed concerns that Tice may have been killed in recent Israeli airstrikes or could have suffocated after Assad's forces cut off power to prisons in Damascus before his departure.

He was captured in the Damascus suburb of Daraya. Reuters reported earlier that in 2013 Tice, a former Marine, managed to slip out of his cell and was seen moving between houses in the streets of Damascus' upscale Mazzeh neighborhood.

He was recaptured soon after his escape, likely by forces who answered directly to Assad, current and former U.S. officials said. Syrian authorities never confirmed that Tice was in their custody. The New York Times first reported that brief escape and recapture.

Tens of thousands of Syrian prisoners walked out of Assad's prisons after his oppressive rule ended.

(Reporting by Jana Choukeir; Editing by Michael Georgy, William Maclean)