SpyTalk

The group includes a former FBI director, an Army general who investigated detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib, and a former Under Secretary of State.

"We urge President Obama to appoint a non-partisan commission of distinguished Americans to examine, and provide a comprehensive report on, policies and actions related to the detention, treatment, and transfer of detainees after 9/11 and the consequences of those actions, and to make recommendations for future policy in this area," the group said in a press release Wednesday.

The statement's signers include former FBI director Judge William Sessions, retired Army Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba, who investigated the Abu Ghraib affair, and Thomas Pickering, the career senior diplomat and former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs.

Other signers included Juan E. Méndez, President of the International Center for Transitional Justice and Rev. John H. Thomas, General Minister and President of the United Church of Christ.  In addition, 18 leading human rights organizations endorsed the statement.

"The president has a responsibility to protect and defend Americans and unfortunately, many questions remain unanswered as to whether the detention, transfer, and treatment of detainees following the September 11th attacks were in the country's best interest," said Sessions in the prepared statement.  "We need to understand what happened and how to prevent any illegal actions from taking place in the future."

Pickering called for "a full accounting and understanding of how American policy got to where we are today."  He added that "a non-partisan commission, removed from the burdensome barriers of politics, is a well proven method of accomplishing these goals."

Court Case

The call for a study commission came the same day a federal appeals court ruled that 17 Turkic Muslims cleared for release from Guantanamo Bay to the United States must stay at the prison for the indefinite future.

The Muslims are Chinese Uighurs (pronounced Wee-gurs), an independence-minded minority who say that they were wrongly detained as terrorists and would face torture if they were returned home.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said a judge went too far last October in ordering the government to allow the 17 men to settle here.

The three-judge panel suggested the detainees could apply for immigration cards at the Department of Homeland Security.  But otherwise, the court emphatically declared, detainees had no constitutional right to immediate freedom.

The men have been held at Guantanamo without charges for nearly seven years.

"Such sentiments, however high-minded, do not represent a legal basis for upsetting settled law and overriding the prerogatives of the political branches," wrote Judge A. Raymond Randolph, an appointee of President George H. W. Bush.

The Associated Press quoted Emi MacLean, an attorney with the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, as saying, "the ball is in President Obama's court. If he is genuinely committed to closing Guantanamo, one clear and immediate step he should take is to release the Uighurs into the U.S."

The White House declined comment, citing ongoing deliberations about how to close Guantanamo after ordering it shuttered as one of President Obama's first executive orders.

Italian Challenge

A major challenge is deciding where to settle the hundreds of prisoners -- most of which are being held without charges -- if no country is willing to take them.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi disclosed last week that he had offered to take some inmates off the Obama administration's hands during a post-inaugural telephone conversation with the new president.

But his own interior minister and some opposition politicians say they oppose it.

About 20 individuals with Italian residence or citizenship remain at Guantanamo, down from 30 detained after Sept. 11, 2001, according to Italian sources.

As many as 10 have criminal records in Italy.

Three of them are still wanted by a Milan prosecutor on criminal charges, according to a leading expert on terrorism in Italy.

The charges include criminal conspiracy, drug trafficking, forgery of documents and robbery, said Leo Sisti, a longtime investigative reporter at L'Espresso, a national weekly magazine based in Milan.

"The crimes were committed before 2000 and of course they were not charged with international terrorism, a crime which was enacted in October 2001 or immediately after 9/11," Sisti said in an e-mail.

Meanwhile, Italy's top counterterrorism prosecutor, Armando Spataro, was quoted by Sisti saying that he was opposed to the return of either Italian citizens or permanent residents who were suspected of terrorist ties by U.S. authorities, but not Italian.

"In Guantanamo we should draw a distinction between different kinds of detainees," Spataro said. "First there are those who were investigated in Italy and are still wanted on arrest warrants issued against them. They can be extradited as a result of standard procedures."

"Then there are other detainees who are not under investigation in our country, but in the U.S.," Spataro added.  "If the U.S. wants to transfer them to Italy following a procedure of expulsion, we should say no."

But a third category of detainees in Guantanamo, Spataro said, "who are not accused of anything, but who worked and lived in Italy without committing crimes -- I think it will be possible to take them back."

Jeff Stein can be reached at jstein@cq.com.