Debra Tice in Damascus in search for missing journalist son, Austin. : NPR

DAMASCUS, Syria— Debra Tice, the mom of American journalist Austin Tice who went lacking in Syria twelve years in the past, is visiting Syria and assembly with officers within the nation’s new de facto authorities within the hopes of discovering new clues as to her son’s whereabouts.

“We’re turning a web page in Syria,” Tice advised reporters in Damascus, Syria’s capital. “I feel it is prudent for us to have very excessive hopes and to consider that we’re going to have the ability to have interaction, and that they are going to need to assist us reunite our households.”

Final December, rebels led by the group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham or HTS, ousted Syria’s former dictator, President Bashar al-Assad. Debra Tice has been attempting to work with Syria’s de facto new authorities to search out her son, Austin, who’s now 43.

Her son went lacking whereas protecting the Syrian civil conflict, after he was taken at a checkpoint within the Damascus suburbs in 2012.

Throughout her go to this week, Debra Tice visited two former navy prisons and met with Syria’s present de facto chief, Ahmed al-Sharaa for about three hours.

Sharaa himself was arrested by American forces and held for 5 years in numerous detention facilities, together with Abu Ghraib in Iraq.

“One of many issues we talked about with Mr. Sharaa was his personal imprisonment,” Tice stated. “They know what we’re going by. And as they do their necessary work, they’re attempting to make issues proper for individuals like us.”

Tice stated Sharaa pledged to assist her. She additionally stated the brand new Trump administration had already reached out to her to assist discover out what occurred to her son.

Tice spent greater than three months dwelling in Syria in 2014, throughout which she stated she grew to like the nation her son reported on. She final visited Syria in 2015, after which the Assad regime didn’t grant her additional visas.

“I do know that I come right here, I’m a part of the Syrian moms,” Tice stated, referring to the moms of tens of hundreds of Syrian who disappeared into Assad’s intensive jail system. “And we will sit down and have tea collectively, and we will additionally perform burdens collectively.”