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MARCO WERMAN: I'm Marco Werman, and this is The World. President Obama wants to resurrect the Bush-era military commissions for putting terrorism suspects on trial. Mr. Obama suspended the commissions when he took office in January and announced he would close the prison at Guantanamo Bay in a year. Today, he called for restoring the military system, with some key changes. But those changes don't seem to be winning over critics. In a moment, we'll hear how Mr. Obama's proposal is being perceived in other parts of the world, but first, The World's Matthew Bell reports on today's announcement.

MATTHEW BELL: Most of the changes President Obama is proposing for revamped military commissions have to do with the admissibility of evidence. Hearsay evidence, along with evidence obtained through cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment would not be allowed in court. Detainees would also have more leeway in choosing lawyers, and those who refuse to testify would have basic protections. Taken together, the White House says these reforms would begin to restore the commissions as a legitimate forum and bring them into line with the rule of law. Still, some left-leaning supports of President Obama are denouncing the decision to maintain a separate military commissions system for terrorist suspects. Asked about that during a news conference this afternoon, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs explained the President's thinking this way.

ROBERT GIBBS: The changes that he is seeking he believes will ensure the protections that are necessary for these to be conducted in order to reach that certain justice as well as live up to our values.

BELL: Gibbs said Mr. Obama made it clear a long time ago that he believed military commissions, when structured properly, should have a place in the US justice system. What's not clear is what other changes the administration might make. About 20 of the 240 or so detainees at Guantanamo are expected to face military tribunals. These include some of the so-called “high value” Al Qaeda suspects. But it's not clear where the military trials would actually take place. Mr. Obama still wants to close the Guantanamo prison by 2010. Military justice expert Eugene Fidell of Yale University, is disappointed in the President's decision. Fidell says this is not the clean break from the previous administration he was hoping for.

EUGENE FIDELL: It's as if the Bush-Cheney administration, which is dead, is ruling us from the grave.

BELL: Fidell worries that politics had something to do with this decision.

FIDELL: I'm no longer willing to take people's word for what can and cannot be prosecuted. I want somebody to explain to me exactly why it is that the district courts, which are the jewel in the crown of our legal system, can't be used to try these cases.

BELL: Another expert who's waiting for a good answer to that question is John Hutson. He's a former Judge Advocate General for the US Navy. Hutson worries about the fact that the Supreme Court has already shot down two iterations of the military commissions system, and he says this third try might not pass muster in the Supreme Court, or in the court of public opinion.

JOHN HUTSON: If you go into it saying – reverse engineering it saying, “Okay. We're going to start a conviction. We need to guarantee a conviction. Now, let's set up a court system that will ensure that result, you've given a bad name to kangaroos.

BELL: Hutson says it's important to convince the rest of the world that the United States is living up to its own standard of justice and fairness – and he thinks it will be difficult to do that by re-starting the military commissions process. For The World, I'm Matthew Bell.

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