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President Barack Obama acknowledged on Wednesday that his administration would not be closing the Guantanamo Bay detention facility by January 2010. The previously promised deadline was mandated nearly a year ago as part of a number of executive orders signed by the President on his second day in office. Obama, in an interview with Fox News, commented on the lapse of his own self-imposed deadline when he said, “We are on a path and a process where I would anticipate that Guantanamo will be closed next year. I’m not going to set an exact date because a lot of this is also going to depend on cooperation from Congress.” While the detention facility remains in operation with no hard date of closure on the horizon, hundreds remain imprisoned there. According to the administration, ninety of Guantanamo’s two-hundred and fifteen prisoners have been cleared for release or repatriation. They continue to be detained, however, because no host countries have come forward in negotiations to take them in. Human rights critics contend that the U.S.’ own reluctance to offer residency to the cleared inmates compounds the situation. Forty to sixty detainees at Guantanamo suspected of terrorism still await trial – whether civilian or military – as dozens of others deemed security threats remain in prison without charge. Meanwhile, the Obama administration has faced political criticism for its plans to move five alleged terror suspects, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, from Guantanamo to New York in order to stand court in a civil trial.

GUEST: Jeremy Varon of Witness Against Torture, Professor of History, New School of Social Research