As part of its plans to close Guantanamo Bay, the Obama administration is considering holding some of the detainees indefinitely and without trial on US soil, US media reported Thursday. President Barack Obama's “administration is weighing plans to detain some terror suspects on US soil – indefinitely and without trial – as part of a plan to retool military commission trials that were conducted for prisoners held in Guantanamo Bay,” The Wall Street Journal said. The report coincides with Obama's reversal of his decision to release photos showing abuse of “war on terror” detainees, saying he feared it would cause a backlash against US troops abroad. The proposal to indefinitely detain detainees, which is part of the administration's internal deliberations on how to deal with the prisoners ahead of a planned closure of the controversial US military prison next year, is being shared with some lawmakers, it added. White House officials had no immediate comment on the detainee deliberations. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who met with White House Counsel Greg Craig this week about the Guantanamo plans, told the Journal that the administration was namely seeking authority for indefinite detentions granted by a national security court. “This is a difficult question. How do you hold someone in prison without a trial indefinitely?” asked Graham, who, along with former Republican presidential nominee Senator John McCain, has pressed for reinstating the military commissions to try Guantanamo detainees. The Journal noted that “the idea of a new national security court has been discussed widely in legal circles,” including by Michael Mukasey, who served as attorney general under president George W. Bush and Neal Katyal, a Justice Department official serving under the Obama administration. US officials told a news agency that Obama is set to announce this week that he is reviving the military trials for terror suspects held at the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay, in southern Cuba. But Obama, who sharply criticized the use of military commissions to try extremists under Bush, may ask lawmakers to expand legal protections for detainees, the officials said, requesting anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.
