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Lebanon’s Director General of Public Security, Major General Abbas Ibrahim, said on Saturday that he moved to Damascus after his visit to Washington, as part of an effort to free US citizen Austin Tice, who is being held in Syria.
In a television interview, Ibrahim said: “After my visit to Washington, I visited Syria for two days, and the investigation on the Austin Tice issue did not stop, nor will it stop, and his mother promised that the issue of sanctions would not it will prevent me from completing your child’s file. “
US President Donald Trump had addressed the case of journalist Tice, a former US Marine who disappeared while working as a journalist in Syria in 2012.
Last month, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing informed sources, that Ibrahim met with US national security adviser Robert O’Brien at the White House to discuss the issue of Americans detained in Syria.
Last month, a US administration official said a White House official traveled to Damascus earlier this year to hold secret meetings with the Syrian government, seeking the release of at least two US citizens, whom Washington believes that the government of President Bashar al-Assad is holding them back.
The official, who asked not to be named, added that Cash Patel, a deputy aide to President Donald Trump and the most senior counterterrorism official in the White House, had visited Damascus.
The Wall Street Journal, citing Trump administration officials and others familiar with the negotiations, reported that Patel’s trip was the first occasion for a senior US official to meet with Damascus government officials in Syria on more than one occasion. decade.
Civil war broke out in Syria nearly ten years ago, after Assad launched a brutal crackdown in 2011 against protesters demanding an end to his family’s rule.
According to the Wall Street Journal, US officials expressed their hope that a deal would be reached with Assad that would allow the release of Austin Tice and Majid Kamalmaz, a Syrian-American doctor who also disappeared after authorities arrested him at a post. of government control in 2017.
The newspaper added that US authorities believe the Syrian government is holding at least four other Americans, but clarified that little is known about them.
