The United States has stopped transferring inmates of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility back to Yemen, where an al-Qaeda arm allegedly plotted the Christmas Day attack on a Detroit-bound airliner, the White House said Tuesday, dpa reported.
About half of the nearly 200 remaining prisoners at Guantanamo are Yemeni citizens, making their fate a key component of the administration's pledge to close the controversial facility in Cuba.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the administration still intended to close Guantanamo, but "the determination has been made that right now any additional transfers to Yemen is not a good idea."
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the 23-year-old Nigerian charged with attempting to blow up the December 25 flight from Amsterdam to Detroit, was reportedly trained and acquired his explosives in Yemen.
The White House has also been under pressure after it emerged that two former Guantanamo detainees have become major figures in the Yemeni-based terrorist group al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Obama originally promised to close Guantanamo by January 22, but has since acknowledged that deadline will not be met.