Politics – Political News

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama plans to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan over six months, an accelerated timetable — with an endgame built in — that would have the first Marines there as early as Christmas, a senior administration official told The Associated Press.

With the full complement of new troops expected to be in Afghanistan by next summer, the heightened pace of Obama’s military deployment in the 8-year-old war appears to mimic the 2007 troop surge in Iraq, a 20,000-strong force addition under former President George W. Bush. Similar in strategy to that mission, Obama’s Afghan surge aims to reverse gains by Taliban insurgents and to secure population centers in the volatile south and east parts of the country.

In a prime-time speech to the nation Tuesday night from West Point that ends a 92-day review, Obama will seek to help sell his much bigger, costlier war plan by tying the escalation to an exit strategy, said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

By laying out a rough timeframe and some dates for when the main U.S. military mission would end, as well as emphasizing stepped-up training for Afghan forces, the president was acknowledging the increasingly divided public opinion over continued American participation in the stalemated war.

“We want to — as quickly as possible — transition the security of the Afghan people over to those national security forces in Afghanistan,” White House press secretary Robert Gibbs told ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “This can’t be nation-building. It can’t be an open-ended forever commitment.”

With U.S. casualties in Afghanistan sharply increasing and little sign of progress, the war Obama once liked to call one “of necessity,” not choice, has grown less popular with the public and within his own Democratic party. In recent days, leading Democrats have talked of setting tough conditions on deeper U.S. involvement, or even staging outright opposition.

The displeasure on both sides of the aisle was likely to be on display when congressional hearings on Obama’s strategy get under way later in the week on Capitol Hill.

In his speech and in meetings overseas in the coming days, Obama also will ask NATO allies to contribute more — between 5,000 and 10,000 new troops — to the separate international force in Afghanistan, diplomats said.

One official from a European nation said the troop figure was included in an official NATO document compiled on the basis of information received from Washington ahead of Obama’s announcement. The NATO force in Afghanistan now stands at around 40,000 troops.

The 30,000 new U.S. troops will bring the total in Afghanistan to more than 100,000 U.S. forces by next summer. New infusions of U.S. Marines will begin moving into Afghanistan almost as soon as Obama announces a redrawn battle strategy.

The president’s long-awaited troop increase had been envisioned to take place over a year, or even more, because force deployments in Iraq and elsewhere make it logistically difficult, if not impossible, to go faster. But Obama directed his military planners to make the changes necessary to hasten the Afghanistan additions, said the official, who declined to be publicly identified because the formal announcement of details was still pending.

Officials were not specific on the withdrawal date that Obama has in mind nor the changes the military will be required to make to get the troop deployments into Afghanistan on the president’s new, speedier timeline.

Military officials said at least one group of Marines is expected to deploy within two or three weeks of Obama’s announcement, and would be in Afghanistan by Christmas. This initial infusion is a recognition by the administration that something tangible needs to happen quickly, military officials said.

The new Marines would provide badly needed reinforcements to those fighting against Taliban gains in the southern Helmand province. They also could lend reassurance to both Afghans and a war-weary U.S. public.

Obama’s announcement comes near the end of a year in which the war has worsened despite the president’s infusion of 21,000 forces earlier this year. He began rolling out his decision Sunday night, informing key administration officials, military advisers and foreign allies in a series of private meetings and phone calls that stretched into Monday.

Previewing a narrative the president is likely to stress, Gibbs told ABC that the number of fresh troops don’t tell the whole story. Obama will emphasize that Afghan security forces need more time, more schooling and more U.S. combat backup to be up to the job on their own.

“We’re going to accelerate going after al-Qaida and its extremist allies,” Gibbs said. “We’ll accelerate the training of an Afghan national security force, a police and an army.”

In Kabul, Lt. Gen. William B. Caldwell, the new head of a U.S.-NATO command responsible for training and developing Afghan soldiers and police, said Tuesday that although the groundwork is being laid to expand the Afghan National Army beyond the current target of 134,000 troops, to be reached by Oct. 31, 2010, no fixed higher target is set.

There is a notional goal of eventually fielding 240,000 soldiers and 160,000 police, but Caldwell said that could change.

“Although that is a goal and where we think it could eventually go to, it’s not a hard, firm, fixed number,” he said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press.

He indicated that one reason for avoiding a hard-and-fast commitment to those higher numbers is the expected cost. So his orders are to reach the targets of 134,000 soldiers and 96,800 police by next October. He intends to hold annual reviews, beginning next spring or early summer, to determine whether the notional higher targets of 240,000 soldiers and 160,000 police — for a combined total of 400,000 by 2013 — are still the right goals for Afghanistan.

“If you grow it up to 400,000 — if you did grow all the way to that number, and if it was required to help bring greater security to this country — then of course you have to sustain it at that level, too, in terms of the cost of maintaining a force that size,” he said. Nearly all the cost of building Afghan forces has been borne by the U.S. and other countries thus far.

Obama also will make tougher demands on the governments of Pakistan and, especially, Afghanistan.

The Afghan government said Tuesday that President Hamid Karzai and Obama had an hourlong video conference. Obama was also going to speak with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari.

In Afghanistan, rampant government corruption and inefficiency have made U.S. success much harder. Obama was expected to place tough conditions on Karzai’s government.

Obama was spending much of Monday and Tuesday on the phone, outlining his plan — minus many specifics — for the leaders of France, Britain, Germany, Russia, China, India, Denmark, Poland and others. He also met in person at the White House with Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.

A briefing for dozens of key lawmakers was planned for Tuesday afternoon, just before Obama was set to leave the White House for the speech against a military backdrop.

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Associated Press writers Robert Burns and Anne Flaherty in Washington and Slobodan Lekic in Brussels contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON (AFP) –
President Barack Obama will on Tuesday announce a swift surge of 30,000 more US troops to Afghanistan within six months, but set a limit on the duration of their deployment, a US official said.

Obama will unveil a political and military gamble aimed at reining in the Taliban insurgency and training the Afghan army in a globally awaited televised speech, after an exhaustive months-long policy review.

While announcing he will pitch 30,000 more troops into the eight-year war, Obama will set a "back-end" for their deployment, to signal the US mission will not be a "decade-long" operation, the official told AFP.

Obama, following a protracted, and divisive policy review, had decided that plans for a slower ramp up of extra US troops would not work given deteriorating security conditions in Afghanistan, the official said.

The length of the mission of the extra US troops, which will take the total US deployment in Afghanistan to 100,000, was not immediately clear.

In the speech at the US Military Academy at West Point at 8:00 pm (0100 GMT Wednesday), Obama must redefine the goals of the Afghan war, for a divided nation dismayed by rising US combat deaths and haunted by economic woes.

He needs to convince skeptics fearing a Vietnam-style quagmire, that a plan to boost troop numbers can fashion a victory of sorts and a path home for US forces sent to war after the September 11 attacks in 2001.

Opinion polls show sliding public support for the war, with more than 900 American soldiers killed in Afghanistan and October the deadliest month yet with 74 US combat deaths. Many more foreign troops and Afghans have died.

Hours before heading to West Point Obama laid out his new strategy in an hour-long video conference with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, officials in Kabul and Washington said.

A US official would not go into detail about the discussions, but Obama aides have said the president will set clear expectations for the Afghan government, in improving security and cracking down on corruption.

Obama was also due to lay out his plans to Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, after briefing Russia, France and Britain on Monday, with calls also scheduled with the German and Chinese leaders.

The president has spent months wrestling with a decision some backers fear could sink the promise of a reforming presidency.

Tuesday's speech, which will also freshen US strategy of Pakistan, will be closely watched by foreign governments weighing US intent and Obama is also expected to ask NATO partners for more troops.

Top advisors said Obama will tell Afghanistan and Pakistan that the United States cannot stay for ever, but also offer an almost contradictory assurance that Washington will not abandon them.

"This is not an open-ended commitment," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.

"We are there to partner with the Afghans, to train the Afghan national security forces, the army and the police, so that they can provide security for their country and wage a battle against an unpopular insurgency."

In a first sign of increased allied help, NATO ally Britain said Monday it would this month send 500 more soldiers to boost its Afghan contingent to 9,500 men and women.

NATO allies France and Germany are also thought to be under pressure to add more troops.

Obama's policy review came to the boil after Afghan commander General Stanley McChrystal reported on the war to the Pentagon in August.

The Washington Post then revealed that the general had warned the war "will likely result in failure" without more troops to crush the insurgency.

Obama's task was further complicated by the corruption-tainted Afghan election, which fanned deep doubts about President Hamid Karzai.

Some administration officials, notably Vice President Joseph Biden, supported a more limited effort to pursue Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

While he will reveal his hand to the American people on Tuesday, Obama signed orders implementing the strategy on Sunday.

He then spoke directly by secure video-link to McChrystal and US ambassador to Kabul Karl Eikenberry.

Anticipating the troop increase, several anti-war groups said that protests are scheduled Tuesday at the main entrance to the West Point academy, and Wednesday at federal buildings in several US cities.

WASHINGTON – A bipartisan amendment to increase insurance benefits for women through yearly screenings gets the first Senate vote Tuesday on health care overhaul legislation.

The amendment — co-sponsored by Sens. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine — would require policies to include a variety of yearly screenings and was inspired in part by controversial recommendations last month that women undergo fewer mammograms and Pap smears to test for cancer.

“My amendment guarantees screening for breast cancer, yes, mammograms,” Mikulski said. “We don’t mandate that you have a mammogram at age 40. What we say is discuss this with your doctor, but if your doctor says you need one, my amendment says you are going to get one.” A vote was expected Tuesday afternoon.

The Congressional Budget office said the amendment would cost $940 million over a decade.

Mikulski has said that her amendment was aimed at preventing insurance companies from using a pair of recommendations for cancer testing in women to deny coverage. Republicans, too, insisted that the recommendations could result in rationing of health care, a charge President Barack Obama’s White House has heatedly denied.

Last month, a government-appointed but independent panel of doctors and scientists said women generally should begin routine mammograms in their 50s, rather than their 40s. Then, in an apparent coincidence, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists said that most women in their 20s can have a Pap test every two years — instead of annually — to catch slow-growing cervical cancer.

Neither the task force, which provides advice to government officials who may or may not act on it, nor the ACOG set federal policy.

But the recommendations could not have come at a worse time for majority Democrats, especially Senate leaders trying to hold together the 60 votes required to advance the health care overhaul.

The legislative struggle is expected to last for weeks in a test that pits GOP senators determined not to give ground against Senate Democrats determined to deliver on Obama’s signature issue.

The 10-year, nearly $1 trillion legislation includes a first-time requirement for most Americans to carry insurance, greatly expands the Medicaid federal-state insurance program for the poor, and would require insurers to cover any paying customer regardless of their medical history or condition.

On Monday each side offered the first of what are likely to be dozens of amendments, with the measures seemingly designed as much to court a skeptical public as to reshape Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s 2,074-page bill.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., attacked the legislation as a “monstrosity” that employs “Bernie Madoff accounting, Enron accounting” as he offered the first GOP amendment. McCain’s amendment would strip out more than $400 billion in Medicare cuts to home health providers, hospitals, hospices and others — a pitch to seniors, who polls show have deep concerns about the legislation.

Democrats planned to go on the offense on the same issue Tuesday with an amendment underscoring benefits to seniors and guaranteeing that basic Medicare benefits would not be touched.

The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that 31 million uninsured individuals would receive insurance if the bill were enacted, many of them assisted by federal subsidies. The legislation would be paid for through a combination of cuts in projected Medicare payments, a payroll tax on the wealthy and taxes on drug makers, medical device manufacturers, owners of high-cost insurance and others.

It has taken months to advance the legislation to the floor, as Democrats struggled with their own internal divisions as well as Republican opposition.

Democrats control 60 seats in the Senate, precisely the number needed to trump a promised Republican filibuster, and Reid’s ability to steer the bill to passage will depend on finding ways to finesse controversial provisions within the measure, such as a proposal for the government to sell insurance in competition with private firms.

Despite the public jousting, significant action was occurring behind the scenes as Reid, D-Nev., and Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, the bill’s author, huddled Monday with top White House and Cabinet officials. The group included Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, along with former Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle, Obama’s first pick for HHS secretary before his nomination was derailed.

Liberals favor the government insurance plan; moderate and conservative Democrats oppose it. As drafted, the bill establishes a so-called government option, although each state can block it. Legislation passed earlier by the House also has a a government option, with no state opt-out provision; it would have to be reconciled with any Senate-passed measure before a final bill could go to Obama’s desk.

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Associated Press Writers David Espo, Laurie Kellman and Charles Babington contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama entered the White House promising a new era of openness in government, but when it comes to bad news, his administration often uses one of the oldest tricks in the public relations playbook: putting it out when the fewest people are likely to notice.

Former White House environmental adviser Van Jones’ resignation over controversial comments hit the trifecta of below-the-radar timing: The White House announced the departure overnight on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend, when few journalists were on duty and few Americans awake, much less paying attention to the news.

As with past administrations, Friday looks like a popular day to “take out the trash,” as presidential aides on the TV drama “The West Wing” matter-of-factly called it. Along with weekends, holidays and the dark of night, the final stretch of the work week, when many news consumers tune out, is a common time for the government to release news unlikely to benefit the president.

Among recent examples: On Friday, Nov. 13, the Obama administration announced it would put the professed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on trial in civilian court in New York. It also disclosed the resignation of the top White House lawyer, who had taken blame for some of the problems surrounding the administration’s planned closing of the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The following Friday, Nov. 20, saw the Justice Department quietly notifying a court that it intended to drop manslaughter and weapons charges against a Blackwater Worldwide security guard involved in a 2007 Baghdad shooting that left 17 Iraqis dead. The court filing was sealed from public view and submitted without ceremony, in contrast to the Monday last December when the charges were announced. Then, the Justice Department held a noon news conference and put out a lengthy press release.

On previous Fridays, the White House acknowledged it may not be able to close the Guantanamo prison by January as the president promised, announced Obama was imposing punitive tariffs on car and light-truck tires from China, and disclosed that Obama had waived conflict-of-interest rules for several aides.

“It’s a time-honored practice where the president’s trying to talk about what he wants to talk about and push the subjects that maybe he doesn’t want to talk as much about into a time when people aren’t paying as much attention,” said Dee Dee Myers, press secretary during Clinton’s first two years in office and a consultant for “The West Wing” “trash day” episode.

If Friday is a prime day to dump potentially unfavorable news in Washington, 5 p.m. is the witching hour.

The day before Halloween, the Obama administration slipped out news on several ongoing issues, much of it in late afternoon or evening. It included developments on warrantless wiretapping, terror interrogations, the CIA leak case, the reliability of the government’s stimulus job creation figures, lobbyists and other visitors to the White House, and the Securities and Exchange Commission’s failure to detect disgraced financier Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme for years.

“The president has taken and will continue to take wide-ranging and unprecedented steps to fulfill his campaign promise to give Americans firsthand access to information about their government at whitehouse.gov,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said, when asked whether dropping important news late on Fridays, when few news consumers are paying attention, squares with the president’s promise of transparency. “The First Amendment to the Constitution ensures that the media is independently responsible for how and when that information is covered.”

Earnest noted that Obama is the first president to routinely release visitor logs, and that while the White House did decide to put them out on Fridays, it moved up the disclosure to Wednesday last week rather than do it the day after Thanksgiving. Of the Madoff example, he said the SEC is an independent agency and makes its own decisions about when to release information.

Obama is far from the only president to make major news at the tail end of, or outside, normal business hours.

President George H.W. Bush granted Christmas Eve pardons in 1992 to former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and several others in the Iran-Contra arms scandal.

Fridays saw many Iran-Contra scandal developments during Ronald Reagan’s presidency, including the resignation of White House chief of staff Donald Regan. And Friday was a common day for President George W. Bush’s administration to release documents in a scandal over U.S. attorney firings.

The “trash day” episode of “The West Wing” was patterned on a Friday heading into the July 4 holiday weekend when the Clinton White House dumped several stories, Myers said.

In Obama’s case, releasing voluminous sets of documents and data late on Fridays, such as White House visitor records and stimulus job figures, isn’t “anti-transparency” because they’re still making the documents available, she said.

“But yes, do you try to manage the flow of information to some degree at the White House? Of course. You’d be a fool not to,” Myers said.

Though the tactic of intentionally dumping some news at off-times persists, it doesn’t always work, said Myers and Lanny Davis, a crisis management attorney in Washington and former special counsel to Clinton.

“If it’s a really bad story it will have its own legs and you’re probably not accomplishing all that much,” Davis said. “Sometimes all you’re accomplishing is irritating reporters.”

Davis points to a famous episode involving President Richard Nixon as an example of weekend timing failing to minimize impact. In an incident known as the “Saturday night massacre,” Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox was fired on Nixon’s orders on a Saturday night in 1973, hours after Cox held a news conference to defy him. The Justice Department’s top two officials resigned rather than be the ones to dismiss Cox.

“It didn’t exactly help Nixon to do it on a Saturday night,” Davis said. “Only, he gave us all a memorable historic expression. The ‘Wednesday night massacre’ doesn’t sound as good as the ‘Saturday night massacre.’”

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Associated Press writers Barry Schweid, Matt Apuzzo and Will Lester contributed to this report.

Dec. 1 (Bloomberg) — President Barack Obama will announce
that he is sending an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to
Afghanistan, tying his presidency to the outcome of a war that
has deteriorated since the U.S. ousted the Taliban from power
eight years ago.

The deployment of the 30,000 troops will be expedited, said
an administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

After a months-long strategy review, Obama tonight will
address a range of listeners, including voters weary of the war,
lawmakers divided over its cost in lives and money, a scandal-
plagued Afghan government and a stubborn Taliban insurgency.

Obama, in speech of 30 to 40 minutes, will announce “an
acceleration” of a strategy to “disrupt, dismantle and destroy
al-Qaeda and its extremist allies” and help prevent another
9/11-style attack, spokesman Robert Gibbs said on NBC’s
“Today” show.

The goal, Gibbs said, is to “transfer the responsibility”
to Afghanistan’s security forces as they meet unspecified
political and civilian benchmarks.

“This will not be nation-building,” Gibbs said. “This
will not be an open-ended commitment.”

Obama called Afghan President Hamid Karzai about 10 p.m.
Washington time yesterday to brief him on the plan, Gibbs told
Bloomberg News. “He walked him through the strategy” but
didn’t get into specific troop numbers, Gibbs said. He also
“reiterated the responsibilities” that Karzai has “to provide
security.”

Obama’s Challenge

Obama’s televised speech from the U.S. Military Academy at
West Point “is really going to prove that he owns the war,”
said Karin von Hippel, a scholar at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies in Washington.

The president’s challenge is to demonstrate the U.S. is
committed to defeating terrorists and stabilizing Afghanistan
without creating the impression that American forces will be
there forever, said Patrick Cronin, a senior director at the
Center for a New American Security in Washington.

“There are multiple messages and multiple audiences,”
said Cronin, who until recently ran the Pentagon’s Institute for
National Strategic Studies. Obama needs “to show the American
public and the Senate and the House of Representatives that we
have an exit strategy, not a permanent commitment,” while
simultaneously convincing Afghanistan, Pakistan and U.S. enemies
“that we are willing to see this through,” he said.

Living With Decision

The new strategy ends Obama’s ability to “blame the last
administration” for failings in Afghanistan, Cronin said. “Now
it’s his war, and he’s going to have to live with the decision
he makes about troops.”

Obama’s main objective is to train Afghan army and police
forces to take over security, Gibbs said yesterday.

Obama has asked allies to provide 10,000 more troops for
the Afghan campaign, including 1,500 from France, 2,000 from
Germany, 1,500 from Italy and 1,000 from Britain, Le Monde
reported today, citing an aide to French President Nicolas
Sarkozy. France may grant the request but wants its extra troops
to focus on training Afghan forces, the newspaper said.

Obama ordered his new strategy into effect on Nov. 29 and
has been explaining the plan to allied leaders, including and
Sarkozy and U.K. Prime Minister Gordon Brown. He’s scheduled to
brief members of Congress from both parties today at the White
House before leaving for West Point.

‘Heavy Lift’

“He has a fairly heavy lift,” said Representative Brian
Baird, a Washington state Democrat who visited Afghanistan
earlier this month. “He has to persuade lawmakers that it’s a
government worth backing, that it’s a mission capable of
succeeding and that Pakistan is viable partner,” Baird said.
“And then he has to somehow pay for it.”

The U.S. public is divided. A CNN/Opinion Research Corp.
poll conducted Nov. 13-15 showed that 50 percent of Americans
would support sending an additional 34,000 troops to Afghanistan
and 49 percent would be opposed. The U.S. now has a force of
about 69,000, with about 36,000 troops from allied nations.

Some Democratic leaders, including Senate Armed Services
Committee Chairman Carl Levin of Michigan and Senate Foreign
Relations Committee chairman John Kerry of Massachusetts, have
questioned an increased military commitment.

Republicans

Republicans, including Arizona Senator John McCain, his
party’s senior member on the Armed Services panel, have said
telegraphing an intention to withdraw from Afghanistan would let
the Taliban and al-Qaeda solidify their presence in areas where
the U.S. is drawing down.

“He has to convey the fact that his strategy is not an
open-ended one for an indefinite war,” said Zbigniew
Brzezinski, former national security adviser to President Jimmy
Carter. “In different ways he’s going to have a hard sell with
both Republicans and Democrats, simply because the country is in
a kind of state of unease.”

U.S. allies face their own political pressures about the
war and will look to Obama’s speech to underscore a durable
American commitment before sending additional troops of their
own, said Brian Katulis, senior fellow at the Center for
American Progress in Washington.

“He’s going to need to give our European friends a boost
and motivation to do more,” Katulis said.

October was the deadliest month for U.S. forces since the
fighting began, with 59 military personnel dead from combat and
accidents, according to Defense Department figures.

Shifting the Fight

Obama took office pledging to shift resources from Iraq to
the fight against the Taliban and al-Qaeda. He ordered an
additional 17,000 combat troops and 4,000 trainers to
Afghanistan earlier this year. In June, he installed General
Stanley McChrystal as his top commander and charged him with
reviewing NATO’s prospects for victory.

Obama’s strategy was devised during a series of White House
Situation Room meetings with foreign policy and military
advisers after McChrystal submitted a request for additional
troops.

Obama has said he wants to set benchmarks to measure
improvements in Afghanistan’s military and government and lay
out a path toward an end to the U.S. engagement.

Some of Obama’s more skeptical listeners may be Democrats.
House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey of Wisconsin
is suggesting a tax on the wealthy to pay for the war. Each
soldier added to the force would cost about $1 million a year,
according to the Office of Management and Budget.

To contact the reporters on this story:
Hans Nichols in Washington at
hnichols2@bloomberg.net ;
Indira Lakshmanan in Washington at
ilakshmanan@bloomberg.net .

AACHEN, Germany – Lawyers for a man accused of murdering Dutch civilians while part of a Waffen SS hit squad says his trial constitutes double jeopardy under a new EU charter and should be halted.

Lawyers for 88-year-old Heinrich Boere petitioned the Aachen state court to stop the proceeding, arguing that it attempted to try the man for essentially the same crimes for which a court in the Netherlands convicted him in absentia in 1949.

He was initially handed a death sentence that was later commuted to life imprisonment, but has managed to avoid jail so far.

Boere faces charges of killing a bicycle-shop owner, a pharmacist and another civilian while serving in an SS unit.

ROME – Two former Guantanamo detainees who will be tried in Italy on terrorism charges have been linked to an Islamic center in Milan described by U.S. authorities as al-Qaida’s main station house in Europe before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, officials said Tuesday.

Adel Ben Mabrouk, 39, and Mohamed Ben Riadh Nasri, 43, of Tunisia, arrived in Italy late Monday, and were immediately taken into custody upon arrival in Milan. Both men are accused of being members of a terror group with ties to al-Qaida and of recruiting fighters for Afghanistan, officials said.

Nasri spoke with prosecutors past midnight, and Mabrouk will be questioned in the next few days.

“He was heard, more than interrogated,” attorney Roberto Novellino said of Nasri. “Physically he’s fine, just tired because the trip was long.” He said Nasri discussed why he was sent to Guantanamo and the circumstances of his transfer there.

Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said Tuesday that Washington has asked Italy to take in more Guantanamo detainees and given a list of names which Rome is studying.

Premier Silvio Berlusconi promised President Barack Obama at a White House meeting in June that Italy would accept three people as part of the U.S. administration’s bid to close down the Guantanamo prison.

Frattini declined to give any details about the third detainee’s identity or arrival date. But he said Italy has agreed “to take in others. They gave us a list of names, which we are examining one by one.”

So far, “we haven’t pinpointed yet” which detainees Italy would take, Frattini said.

Italy took in the Tunisians as a “concrete political sign” of Italy’s commitment to help the U.S. close Guantanamo, Justice Minister Angelino Alfano said in a statement late Monday.

Prosecutors said that two collaborators in Italy’s witness protection program have given statements on the two Tunisians. Interior Minister Roberto Maroni said he wants them to be put on trial and convicted quickly.

According to prosecutors, a lawyer and a transcript obtained by The Associated Press, both men frequented an Islamic center in Milan in the 1990s that a U.S. Treasury report at the time labeled as “the main al-Qaida station house in Europe.”

Lazhar Ben Mohamed Tlil, a key prosecution witness, said Nasri, known by his alias Abou Doujana, was head of an organization of Tunisians at a camp in Afghanistan where recruits received both ideological and military training. It was at this camp, the witness said, that he and other recruits were taught that “to kill infidels was the duty of every Muslim” and were prepared to carry out suicide attacks.

Tlil was recently questioned by U.S. investigators and identified from photos fellow Tunisian trainees in the Afghan camps, his court-appointed lawyer, Davide Boschi, told the AP.

Nasri had previously fought in Bosnia, according to the witness.

An Italian prosecutor, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Mabrouk and Nasri traveled from Italy to Afghanistan and, once there, maintained a “functional relationship inside the organization” of Tunisians here to recruit fighters for suicide missions.

Nasri was allegedly the head of the organization and was described by the U.S. military as a “dangerous” Tunisian operative when he appeared before a U.S. military review panel.

Obama confirmed last month that he would miss his January deadline to close the Guantanamo prison — partly because he cannot persuade other nations to take the detainees.

The U.S. administration says about 90 of the estimated 210 men now held at the U.S. military base can be released or repatriated. But Washington still has to figure out where it will try 40 to 60 prisoners suspected of terrorism and where to relocate dozens more it wants to continue to holding without charge because it lacks the evidence to try them but fears their release.

The U.S. alleged that Nasri traveled to Afghanistan, via Italy and Pakistan, and trained at an al-Qaida-linked camp. He fled from Jalalabad, Afghanistan, when it fell to the Northern Alliance and was wounded in the U.S. bombing of the Tora Bora area, where he was captured and turned over to American forces.

Nasri also had alleged links to Muslim fighters in Bosnia as well as Algerian militants, officials said in documents released after he appeared at the military panel. He was also previously convicted in Italy for passing counterfeit money, and was convicted in Tunisia of being a member of a terrorist organization and sentenced to 10 years, the documents said.

He told the U.S. military that he did not belong to a Tunisian Islamist group, much less head one, and denies ever trying to overthrow the Tunisian government.

In Italy, Nasri is accused along with eight other people of criminal association, aiding illegal immigration and terrorism charges stemming from 1997-2001.

Mabrouk had been held without charge at Guantanamo since February 2002.

He lived in Italy before traveling to Afghanistan in early 2001, according to the transcript of his hearing before the U.S. military panel that reviewed his case. U.S. authorities alleged he had links to al-Qaida and trained at one its camps. The U.S. also alleged he had previously associated with extremists in Bosnia and had been sentenced to 20 years in prison in Tunisia for being a member of a terrorist organization.

Mabrouk’s 2005 arrest warrant in Italy accuses him of international terrorism, falsification of documents, aiding illegal immigration, theft and drug trafficking. He is alleged to have been part of a group affiliated with the Milan mosque that provided logistical and financial support for recruiting fighters for Iraq.

Mabrouk was captured on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border by Pakistani forces and turned over to the U.S.

He told the U.S. military panel that he only went to Afghanistan as an immigrant and did receive some weapons training but denied ever being in Bosnia or knowing about any prison sentence in Tunisia, according to U.S. military documents.

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Associated Press writers Colleen Barry, Nicole Winfield and Frances D’Emilio contributed to this report.