Panel: 50 Gitmo Prisoners Must Be Kept Indefinitely

Task force says 110 can be released
By Harry Kimball,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 22, 2010 9:43 AM CST
Panel: 50 Gitmo Prisoners Must Be Kept Indefinitely
Flags hang above the sign marking the Camp Justice compound, the site of the U.S. war crimes tribunal, at Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base, Cuba.   (AP Photo)

A task force spearheaded by the Justice Department recommends that 50 of the 196 detainees at Guantanamo Bay be held indefinitely without trial. The group, providing a specific breakdown for the first time, determined that the 50 prisoners were too dangerous to release and that any trial would expose state secrets. Of the rest of the detainees, it recommends that 35 stand military or federal trial, and around 110 be released.

Of those 110, about 80 have been cleared for immediate release to their home country or a third party. The others are all Yemenis who should be released only when conditions in their nation stabilize. Though advocates of the closing of Guantanamo will likely be irked by the recommendations, the administration says they represent progress. “We’re still moving forward and in a much more deliberate and less haphazard manner than was the case before,” an official tells the Washington Post. “All policies encounter reality.” (More Guantanamo Bay stories.)

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