Fresh plans to replace Guantanamo

THE Obama administration is looking at creating a courtroom-within-a-prison complex in the US to house suspected terrorists, combining military and civilian detention facilities at a single maximum-security prison.

Several senior US officials said the administration is eyeing a soon-to-be-shuttered state maximum security prison in Michigan and the 134-year-old military penitentiary at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, as possible locations for a heavily guarded site to hold the 229 suspected al-Qaida, Taliban and foreign fighters now jailed at the Guantanamo Bay camp in Cuba.

The officials outlined the plans – the latest effort to comply with President Barack Obama’s order to close the prison camp by January 22, 2010, and satisfy congressional and public fears about incarcerating terror suspects on American soil – on condition of anonymity because the options are under review.