Syrian government releases American citizen

Also Friday, the State Department said the US continues to do its best to ensure the safe release of Americans who are missing or being held hostage in Syria.

The person was identified by the Associated Press and the Washington Post as Kevin Patrick Dawes, a freelance photographer who ended up in one of Syria’s several political prisons.

The U.S. State Department had taken the lead on winning Dawes’s release, which took place in the last few days, according to a State Department official.

Tice, of Houston, Texas, disappeared in August 2012 while covering Syria’s civil war.

The officials say Dawes was abducted after traveling to the country in 2012.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner would not confirm the identity if the released American Friday, citing “privacy concerns”, but said that reports of his identity are “not inaccurate”.

“We are obviously in direct contact with his family as well as the families of many USA citizens detained there”.

“We are appreciative of efforts on the part of the Russian government that it undertook on behalf of this USA citizen”, Toner said, adding that the Czech Republic, as protecting power, provided consular support for the release.

Toner said he was not aware that the Syrian government received anything in exchange for freeing the US citizen.

He told NPR that he went to Libya to “see the world, experience new things, get in way over my head, but, you know, ultimately survive”.

Interestingly, Dawes had been in the middle of another warzone about a year prior to going to Syria, when he worked in Libya in 2011 as a medic for the Libyan rebels who were trying to overthrow ruler Muammar Gaddafi. Tice’s family had no immediate comment.