• Obama has always been critical of U.S. detention policies and says too many prisoners
languish in Guantanamo without fair trials. ? As a senator, Obama voted YES on preserving habeus
corpus for Guantanamo detainees.  He stated, "Why don't we close Guantanamo and restore the right of
habeas corpus, because that's how we lead, not with the might of our military, but the power of our
ideals and the power of our values. It's time to show the world we're not a country that ships
prisoners in the dead of night to be tortured in far off countries. We're not a country that runs
prisons which locks people away without ever telling them why they're there or what they're charged
with. We're not a country which preaches compassion to others while we allow bodies to float down
the streets of major American cities. That's not who we are."

• In May 2008 while campaigning in North Carolina, Obama said, ?We can set the highest
standards around the world for human rights and rule of law and close Guantanamo and restore habeas
corpus." 

• In May 2009 Obama announced a plan which would lead to the closure of Guantanamo Bay prison
within a year. The plan called for terror suspects locked up in the prison to be brought to the
United States mainland where they would be tried and prosecuted. Of the detainees who would be
brought to the country, some would be set free. The rest would be able to exercise constitutional
rights and would undergo open trials. Nearly one year later we are no closer to closing Guantanamo
and sources say it will take another year to accomplish.   It is still not clear where the how the
detainees will be tried or the location of the trials. 

• Obama is strongly against the idea of trying the terror suspects in the Cuban island
itself, an idea that was favored by George Bush. Obama advisers who charted out the plan believe
that the process of bringing the suspects to the mainland might be complicated and may invite
controversies but that is not a task that cannot be accomplished. Obama advisers are of the notion
that the detainees can be guarded as well in the US as anywhere else. 

• Obama's plan proposes a novel court system which will be a sort of military commissions
dispensing justice. A committee will be set up to decide the workings of the court. The detainees
who will be released will be sent back to the countries from where they were captured for further
proceedings if any. Others may be prosecuted in the US criminal courts.

• Obama argues that the Military Commissions Act of 2006 is flawed and calls for a reform of
the trials from its present format. Obama is all for "a process that adheres to rule of law, habeas
corpus, basic principles of Anglo-American legal system, but doing it in a way that doesn't result
in releasing people who are intent on blowing us up."

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