An American freed in Syria on Thursday said he entered the country on foot seven months ago and was on a Christian pilgrimage when he was detained by President Bashar al-Assad's regime.
Travis Timmerman was first seen in a video posted online on Thursday, after rebels captured the capital Damascus over the weekend and overthrew Assad's regime.
In the video, a bearded Timmerman was seen lying on a mattress under a blanket in what appeared to be a private home. A group of men appearing in the video said he was receiving adequate treatment and would be able to return home safely, the Associated Press reported.
Some people who saw the video initially believed Timmerman was Austin Tice, an American journalist and Marine Corps veteran who disappeared in Syria 12 years ago. Tice was still missing as of Thursday morning, but U.S. officials said they believed he was still alive.
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Later Timmermann told Al Arabiya Television Network. In an interview, he said he was detained after illegally entering Syria on foot from the eastern Lebanese town of Saar seven months ago.
He said guards treated him courteously during his detention, but he could hear other people, believed to be young men, being tortured every day.
“It was okay. I was fed, I was given water. The only problem was I couldn't go to the bathroom when I wanted to,” she said, adding that guards only let her out three times a day. pointed out.
On Sunday, thousands of people were released from Syria's Saidnaya military prison, just north of Damascus, after rebels overthrew Bashar al-Assad's regime. This infamous prison is known as the “human slaughterhouse”. (AP Photo/Hussein Mara)
“I wasn't hit and the guards treated me well,” he added.
U.S. officials had no immediate comment on Timmerman.
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Meanwhile, the Biden administration sent the US government's top hostage negotiator, Roger Carstens, to Lebanon earlier this week in hopes of gathering information on Tice's whereabouts.
The State Department's Rewards for Justice program is offering $10 million for information related to the Austin Tice discovery. (Rewards for State Department Justice)
Tais was detained in Damascus in August 2012 while reporting on the uprising against Assad's regime, which marked the early stages of Syria's civil war.
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Tice was last seen in a video released weeks after her disappearance, in which she can be seen blindfolded and held down by armed men, saying, “Oh, Jesus.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
