‘Top priority’: US renews push to find Austin Tice after al-Assad toppled

The US journalist is believed to be among 135,000 people detained or disappeared by Syrian government during war.

The United States has renewed its efforts to locate missing journalist Austin Tice in Syria in the immediate aftermath of the toppling of the country’s longtime leader Bashar al-Assad in a surprise offensive.

Just a day after opposition fighters led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group took control of Damascus, White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Monday that finding Tice is a “top priority”.

Also on Monday, the FBI reupped a $1m reward for “information that leads to Austin’s safe return”.

Sullivan said with al-Assad having fled the country and his regime collapsed, Washington is seeking to “locate the prison where [Tice] may be held, get him out, get him home safely to his family”.

Tice has been missing since 2012 when he was abducted in Damascus while reporting on the popular uprising against al-Assad. Efforts to locate the former US marine, who was working as a freelance journalist at the time of his disappearance, have been fruitless as the bloody war stretched on.

US officials were talking with Turkiye and people on the ground in Syria, asking them, “‘Help us with this. Help us get Austin Tice home,’” Sullivan said.

Turkiye has been one of the leading foreign supporters of rebel groups in Syria despite being at odds with Kurdish groups opposed to al-Assad who are supported by the US.

The latest push comes as rebel groups – in their lightning offensive across Syria – have released thousands of prisoners held for years under al-Assad’s government. Many of their fates had remained unknown to family amid what rights monitors have described as the former Syrian leader’s brutal crackdown on any perceived form of dissent.

In 2023, the Syrian Network for Human Rights reported that more than 155,000 people had been detained or forcibly disappeared since Syria’s war began in 2011 with more than 135,000 believed to be held by al-Assad.

The others are said to have been detained or disappeared at the hands of other actors inside the fractured country, including ISIL (ISIS), which controlled large swaths of Syria and Iraq during the height of its influence.

‘Austin Tice is alive’

US President Joe Biden had previously pushed for Tice’s release with the Department of State in 2022 saying it was “directly engaged” with Syrian officials on the matter. The al-Assad government had repeatedly denied it was holding Tice.

Nevertheless, in delivering his first public response on the opposition takeover in Syria, Biden on Sunday voiced hope that Tice could still be saved.

“We think we can get him back, but we have no direct evidence of that yet. And Assad should be held accountable,” Biden said. “We have to identify where he is.”

Tice was last seen in a video released weeks after his abduction, showing him blindfolded and held by armed men. He is heard saying, “Oh, Jesus.”

In a statement on Monday, the missing man’s parents said they expected to see their son again.

“Austin Tice is alive, in Syria, and it’s time for him to come home. We are eagerly anticipating seeing Austin walk free and we are asking anyone who can do so to please assist Austin so he can safely return home to our family,” Marc and Debra Tice said.