Maher Tahan was arrested along with Abd al-Aziz al-Khayyir, the head of the Foreign Affairs Office of the National Coordination Body for Democratic Change (NCB), by the Air Force Intelligence at a checkpoint after arriving in Damascus following a visit to China on behalf of the NCB. Unofficial sources claim that he was taken to an Air Force Intelligence branch in al-Mezzeh, Damascus, and was then transferred to an unknown location in February 2013.

The Syrian authorities deny his arrest and detention and the state news agency, SANA, stated that he had been kidnapped by members of a “terrorist group”. A number of other NCB members also remain detained or subjected to enforced disappearance.