American journalist Austin Tice was one of the longest-held American hostages when she was kidnapped in Syria in 2012 while conducting a interview. Her mother returned to the country for the first time in a decade to restart the search for her son.

Debra Tice’s visit comes after the regime of Bashar al-Assad collapsed last month amid a fierce rebel offensive. Her son, now 43, is a freelance journalist who was captured while traveling through the Damascus suburb of Daraya to cover the Syrian civil war.

“We have information, but the whole world has changed,” she said in an interview in the Syrian capital Damascus, referring to Assad’s ouster.

“We don’t know where he is right now. It feels a little like square one, trying to figure that out again.”

Theis was last seen blindfolded and looking in pain in a video posted online weeks after his arrest. No government or organization has claimed to be behind his disappearance, although for years U.S. officials said they believed Tice was being held by Assad’s government.

Investigators believe Tice, a former U.S. Marine, briefly escaped weeks after his arrest but was recaptured by forces reporting directly to Assad, according to recent reports in U.S. media.

Last month, after rebels led by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ousted Assad and seized power, President Joe Biden said the United States believed Tice was alive but his whereabouts remained unknown. The rebels opened Syrian prisons, freed thousands of people and gave experts access to documents that could shed light on what happened to Theis and other missing people.

“I never had a doubt…I always knew (Tice) was going to be free. And, you know, we had a whole new way of thinking about how that was going to happen,” she said. “I can’t wait to hug (him).”

Debra Tice met with Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa on Sunday and said she wears her “Free Austin Tice” even at home Badge, who vowed to hold accountable those responsible for the worst crimes during the Assad regime. .

She said she hoped the families would continue to have access to facilities housing inmates “to allow people to search and keep hope alive.”

“I’m here to be with people who understand the longing, to be able to celebrate with people who are being reunited, and to hold the hearts of those of us who are still searching and waiting and hoping and wishing and praying.”

She last visited Syria in 2015, when the country’s authorities stopped issuing her a visa. Now, she said, “people are more relaxed” and “the kids have smiles on their faces.”

“I want to be one of the mothers, one of the families that finds the person I love and puts my arms around them and brings them home,” she said.