Washington — The collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria has raised hopes that more information could come to light on the whereabouts of journalist Austin Tice, who is believed to still be alive more than 12 years after his kidnapping.
After a rebel offensive brought an end to the 50-year rule of the Assad family on Sunday, President Biden expressed optimism that Tice could be returned to the U.S.
“We think we can get him back, but we have no direct evidence of that yet,” Mr. Biden said at the White House Sunday. “We have to identify where he is.”
Tice, a Marine veteran and freelance journalist disappeared on Aug. 14, 2012, while he was reporting on the Syrian civil war. Weeks later, a short video appeared online that showed a distressed Tice blindfolded with his apparent captors. It was the last time he was seen.
Though no one has ever claimed responsibility for his disappearance, Mr. Biden previously said that the U.S. knows “with certainty that he has been held by the Syrian regime.”
“We remain committed to returning him to his family,” Mr. Biden said Sunday.
Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in an interview with “CBS Mornings” on Monday that the U.S. has been in engaged with its allies and others on the ground in Syria “to track who’s coming out of these prisons.”
“We are committed to reuniting Austin Tice with his family, and we’re going to work with people in Syria to make that happen,” Sullivan said.
State Department spokesman Matthew Miller confirmed Monday that the government’s top hostage negotiator, Roger Carstens, is in neighboring Lebanon working on Tice’s case.
“He is in Beirut to talk with people in the region, to talk with parties in the region, to collect information and to try to find out where Austin Tice is and get him home as soon as possible,” Miller said.
CBS News has reached out to the Tice family for comment.
Tice family says “significant source” provided new details
Two days before rebels toppled the Assad regime, Tice’s parents and siblings questioned Sullivan about his case in a meeting they said had been planned for months.
Debra Tice, his mother, said at a news conference later in the day that “Austin Tice is alive” and “is being cared for and he is well.” She said the information was from a “significant source” that had been vetted by the U.S. government.
Marc Tice, his father, said the new information “is very different” from past leads.
“We are confident that this information is fresh. It indicates as late as earlier this year that Austin is alive and being cared for,” he said.
But the family also said they’re frustrated with the U.S. government’s inability to bring him home and said they received few assurances about the Biden administration’s efforts.
“There just seems to be a massive disconnect between what President Biden has dictated for Austin in terms of doing everything that we can to bring him home, and then the actions and the behavior of the people that sit just below him,” his brother Simon Tice said at the news conference.
The family also blamed the U.S. government for preventing the release of information about the source of Austin Tice’s well-being.
