Lebanese security chief visited Syria in efforts to free U.S. captive
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[November 14, 2020]
AMMAN (Reuters) - Lebanese Security
Chief Abbas Ibrahim visited Damascus after a trip to Washington as part
of efforts to free U.S. citizen Austin Tice, who is thought to be held
in Syria, Lebanese broadcaster al Jadid reported on Saturday.
Ibrahim told al Jadid he went on a two day visit to Damascus and was in
regular contact with Tice's mother to tell her that he would continue to
work on her son's "file".
"I won't stop working on this subject and I promised Tice's mother whom
I met in Washington and am in daily touch with on the phone," he told
the broadcaster.
U.S. President Donald Trump has adopted the case of the freelance
journalist and former U.S. Marine officer who disappeared while
reporting in Syria in 2012.
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Abbas said the trip to Damascus came after he visited Washington last
month where he met with national security adviser Robert O’Brien.
A Trump administration official on Oct.18 confirmed a newspaper report
that a White House official travelled to Damascus earlier this year for
secret meetings with the Syrian government seeking the release of Tice
and another U.S. citizen.
The trip was the first time such a high-level U.S. official had met in
Syria with the isolated government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad
in more than a decade.
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![](../images/111420pics/news_w43.jpg)
Marc and Debra Tice, parents of U.S. journalist Austin Tice, talk
during a news conference in Beirut, Lebanon December 4, 2018.
REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir
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Syria erupted into civil war nearly a decade ago after Assad in 2011
began a brutal crackdown on protesters calling for an end to his
family’s rule.
(Reporting by Suleiman Al-Khalidi; Additional reporting by Laila
Bassam in Beirut, Editing by Mark Potter and Christina Fincher)
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