The US Senate has eased the way for the government to speed up the transfer of prisoners from Guantanamo Bay to their home countries, a crucial step toward the long-delayed closure of the military prison.
Under a bipartisan deal tucked inside a broader defence spending bill that received final congressional approval, lawmakers loosened some restrictions on president Barack Obama's ability to send more of the 158 remaining inmates home after years of detention without trial at the US Naval Base in Cuba.
Mr Obama will still face major obstacles to shutting Guantanamo but he will be in a better position than before to take steps to reduce the detainee population at the facility, which has long been the object of international condemnation.
"While the bill does not address all of the administration's concerns, its provisions ... will provide the administration additional flexibility to transfer detainees abroad consistent with our national security interests," White House spokesman Jay Carney said.
Mr Obama repeatedly pledged to close Guantanamo when he was campaigning for a first term and after he took office in 2009. But he blamed congressional resistance for frustrating his efforts to empty the camp, which was opened by his predecessor, George W. Bush, to hold terrorism suspects rounded up overseas after the September 11th, 2001, attacks.
Renewing his commitment to close the prison, Mr Obama insisted earlier this year that keeping Guantanamo open hurt America’s moral standing and that it was “not sustainable ... to keep over 100 individuals in a no-man’s land in perpetuity.”
The administration then named two special envoys to oversee the effort, stepped up negotiations with other countries, including Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Yemen, and worked with Congress to craft a compromise deal.
Though lawmakers on both sides of the aisle refused to budge on a ban on bringing Guantanamo prisoners to the US mainland, they gave ground on rules for sending prisoners home.
Human Rights First hailed the vote as “a new foundation for bringing the number of Guantanamo detainees down to zero.”
“We do not expect the administration to close Guantanamo tomorrow,” the group said. “It will be a methodical process of whittling down the detainee population as the administration negotiates appropriate security assurances from host nations.”
Reuters