A White House meeting planned for Friday about the future of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility has been canceled after The Associated Press reported the Bush administration was "nearing a decision" to close the center.
National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said there would be no meeting Friday, but he would not comment on the reasons for the cancellation
Earlier Thursday, AP reported that officials were close to a decision to shut down the facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and that the administration had scheduled a meeting to discuss a proposal to transfer the detainees to other military prisons.
Officials from the White House, the Pentagon and the Justice and State departments denied the AP report.
"The administration is not 'nearing a decision' on changing our long-held policy to shut down Gitmo in a responsible way," said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino. "There is no meeting tomorrow."
Johndroe said the president has "long expressed a desire to close" the detention center, but "a number of steps need to take place before that can happen."
Those steps include establishing military commissions and sending home the detainees who have been cleared for release, he said.
"These and other steps have not been completed. No decisions on the future of Guantanamo Bay are imminent, and there will not be a White House meeting tomorrow," he said.
Johndroe later told CNN that a meeting had been set but was canceled.
Official: We all want to see Guantanamo closed as soon as possible
A senior State Department official told CNN that the administration was not changing its course on Guantanamo and that regular, "high-level" discussions on the facility take place.
"We are working hard on this," the official said, adding that the administration was "in the process of negotiating agreements" on those at Guantanamo Bay both to transfer them to other facilities and to put them on trial. "We all want to see it [Guantanamo Bay] closed as soon as possible."
There are about 375 detainees held at Guantanamo Bay, according to the Pentagon. Among those are 14 "high-level detainees" formerly held in secret CIA prisons, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the suspected mastermind behind the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
Senior administration officials said the facility will eventually be shut down.
"It's just a matter of figuring out how to get there," one official said. "It's a complicated, complex issue."
Officials said there have been numerous discussions on the issue involving Cabinet-level officials but none yet involving President Bush.
One item being worked on is reaching agreement with Afghanistan to build a prison, where several dozen detainees could be transferred, officials said.
"There are 375 detainees," one official said."If we transferred the Afghan prisoners, that would put us at less than 100 at the camp. This would be a reasonable number. It would allow us to then figure out who to try and get the military commissions up and running."
"But we still need to build the prison, train the guards and transfer people. All of this takes time," the official said.
Another issue, the officials said, is to establish working agreements with foreign governments to take remaining detainees to countries where they would be treated humanely but not released prematurely, which they said has been a problem in the past.
National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said there would be no meeting Friday, but he would not comment on the reasons for the cancellation
Earlier Thursday, AP reported that officials were close to a decision to shut down the facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and that the administration had scheduled a meeting to discuss a proposal to transfer the detainees to other military prisons.
Officials from the White House, the Pentagon and the Justice and State departments denied the AP report.
"The administration is not 'nearing a decision' on changing our long-held policy to shut down Gitmo in a responsible way," said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino. "There is no meeting tomorrow."
Johndroe said the president has "long expressed a desire to close" the detention center, but "a number of steps need to take place before that can happen."
Those steps include establishing military commissions and sending home the detainees who have been cleared for release, he said.
"These and other steps have not been completed. No decisions on the future of Guantanamo Bay are imminent, and there will not be a White House meeting tomorrow," he said.
Johndroe later told CNN that a meeting had been set but was canceled.
Official: We all want to see Guantanamo closed as soon as possible
A senior State Department official told CNN that the administration was not changing its course on Guantanamo and that regular, "high-level" discussions on the facility take place.
"We are working hard on this," the official said, adding that the administration was "in the process of negotiating agreements" on those at Guantanamo Bay both to transfer them to other facilities and to put them on trial. "We all want to see it [Guantanamo Bay] closed as soon as possible."
There are about 375 detainees held at Guantanamo Bay, according to the Pentagon. Among those are 14 "high-level detainees" formerly held in secret CIA prisons, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the suspected mastermind behind the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
Senior administration officials said the facility will eventually be shut down.
"It's just a matter of figuring out how to get there," one official said. "It's a complicated, complex issue."
Officials said there have been numerous discussions on the issue involving Cabinet-level officials but none yet involving President Bush.
One item being worked on is reaching agreement with Afghanistan to build a prison, where several dozen detainees could be transferred, officials said.
"There are 375 detainees," one official said."If we transferred the Afghan prisoners, that would put us at less than 100 at the camp. This would be a reasonable number. It would allow us to then figure out who to try and get the military commissions up and running."
"But we still need to build the prison, train the guards and transfer people. All of this takes time," the official said.
Another issue, the officials said, is to establish working agreements with foreign governments to take remaining detainees to countries where they would be treated humanely but not released prematurely, which they said has been a problem in the past.
CNN's Suzanne Malveaux, Zain Verjee and Jamie McIntyre contributed to this report.
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