The US government has chosen a prison in the Midwestern state of Illinois to hold terrorism suspects currently housed at the US military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, The New York Times reported Tuesday.
Officials were expected to announce later Tuesday that the maximum-security Thomson Correctional Center, about 240 kilometres west of Chicago, would hold Guantanamo detainees as part of President Barack Obama's plan to shutter the controversial facility in Cuba, an unnamed official told the newspaper, DPA reported.
Talk of the prison being used to house the detainees first surfaced late last month, and some state officials have lobbied for the move, saying it would bring jobs to the rural area. Others have decried the move for making the state a possible terrorist target.
After taking office in January, Obama announced plans to close Guantanamo within a year. He has since acknowledged he would not meet his self-imposed January 22 deadline to close the facility but said he remains committed to shutting it down.
This month, Defence Secretary Robert Gates said the government was in the "final stages" of finding an alternate site in the United States to hold Guantanamo prisoners who would not be released or transferred to another country.
There are still about 215 detainees in the prison at the US naval installation. Gates said the Pentagon has identified 116 who are eligible to be transferred to other countries.
Obama established a task force dedicated to Guantanamo days after taking office to determine, among other things, which detainees would be released or transferred or tried in courts-martial or federal court.
The Justice Department announced in November that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other detainees suspected of plotting the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington would be tried in a New York federal court while others are to be brought before military commissions.
Report: US to tap Illinois prison to house Guantanamo detainees
