(20 Jan 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Damascus, Syria – 20 January 2025
1. Various of briefing with Debra Tice, mother of missing American journalist Austin Tice, and audience
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Debra Tice, mother of missing American journalist Austin Tice:
“On January 20th, President Donald Trump will sworn into office and a page will be turned. I have great hope that the Trump administration will sincerely engage in diligent work to bring Austin home. I look forward to working closely with his new team.”
3. Wide of Tice during briefing
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Debra Tice, mother of missing American journalist Austin Tice:
“I have not been able to see him or talk to him since then, but I know he is here. Austin, if you can somehow hear this, I love you. I know you’re not giving up, and neither am I. Many people are praying for the day when you will walk free."
5. Mid of camera
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Debra Tice, mother of missing American journalist Austin Tice:
"During my time here in Damascus, I have been privileged to meet with the new leadership of Syria. It was so wonderful to learn that they are dedicated and determined to bring home my son and your son. They have known imprisonment, either personally or in their families. They know what we are going through and as they do their important work, they are trying to make things right for people like us.”
7. Pan right from audience to Tice speaking
8. Close of camera
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Debra Tice, mother of missing American journalist Austin Tice:
(Speaking on military intelligence prisons in Syria following her visits)
“I hardly even know what to say about that experience. It was beyond anything I could have imagined. These pictures don’t even begin to tell you how unbelievably, unbelievably horrible, awful, terrible, nightmare they are.”
10. Wide of briefing
STORYLINE:
The mother of American journalist Austin Tice made her first visit to Syria in almost a decade on Monday and said that the administration of President-elect Donald Trump had offered support to help find her son, who disappeared in 2012.
Debra Tice made the remarks at a news conference in Damascus in her first visit to the country since insurgents toppled President Bashar Assad last month.
She did not present any new findings in the ongoing search.
Austin Tice disappeared near the Syrian capital in 2012, and has not been heard from since other than a video released weeks later that showed him blindfolded and held by armed men.
Tens of thousands are believed to have gone missing in Syria since 2011, when countrywide protests against Assad spiralled into a devastating civil war.
Outgoing U.S. President Joe Biden told reporters at the White House in December that he believes Washington can bring Tice back, while admitting that “we have no direct evidence” of his well-being.
"I have great hope that the Trump administration will sincerely engage in diligent work to bring Austin home,” Tice said on Monday.
Syria’s former government had publicly denied that it was holding him, but Tice hopes she will find him with the help of the new leadership.
In December, she said the family had information from an unidentified source that her son was alive and well. She said Monday she still believes he is alive and in good health.
“Austin, if you can somehow hear this, I love you. I know you’re not giving up, and neither am I,” she said.
Tice, who is from Houston, has had his work published by The Washington Post, McClatchy newspapers and other outlets.
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