Hostage envoy Roger Carstens traveled to Syria Friday, making the first known U.S. in-person contact with the caretaker government, and seeking help in finding missing American Austin Tice.

To my colleagues in the press,” Hunter wrote recently, asking for support, “do not let Austin Tice be forgotten. Keep asking tough questions and demanding answers until the administration takes action and makes his release a priority.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Tice's mother his country won't conduct airstrikes near a secret prison outside Damascus.

We should ask the militants who toppled Bashar al-Assad in Syria what became of missing U.S. reporter Austin Tice and why

We hold Bashar al-Assad and his criminal regime accountable for the consequences of Austin’s disappearance and the pain inflicted on his mother — pain, tears and separation," a spokesman told NBC News.

The mother of Austin Tice, who was taken captive in Syria in 2012, voiced hope that upheaval in the country will lead to freedom for her son.

Nongovernmental workers and journalists have scoured prisons for clues about his fate in the absence of an official American presence in the country.

Journalist Austin Tice was taken hostage in Syria twelve years ago. Now there's finally reason to believe he may return. The U.S. government must act.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he would enquire about the whereabouts of Austin Tice, the American journalist missing in Syria, while responding to a question from an NBC correspondent at his lengthy end-of-year press conference.

More than any moment since he was taken from us, we have a reason to believe that Austin Tice may return from Syria.

Transitions between administrations often become quiet periods of several months for hostage cases. But after 12 years in Syria, Austin may not have months to spare.