Guantánamo Bay returned back in news after President Barack Obama back tracked on his 2008 election promise regarding the controversial detention centre.

Guantánamo Bay is a bay located in Guantánamo Province at the southeastern end of Cuba. It is the largest harbor on the south side of the island and is surrounded by steep hills creating an enclave cut off from its immediate hinterland.

American President Obama had promised to close it down during his campaign in 2008 Presidential elections. But his promise crumbled, when he said that military commission trials for detainees would resume at Guantánamo after a two-year suspension.

However, Obama said that he is committed to closing Guantánamo someday and to charging some terrorism suspects in civilian criminal courts. But Congress has blocked the transfer of prisoners from Guantánamo to the United States for trial, frustrating the administration's plan to hold civilian trials for Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the self-professed chief plotter of the Sept. 11 attacks, and others accused of terrorism, the New York Times reports.

The BBC's Washington correspondent Andrew North was allowed an inside peek into the legendary detention center, which has held some of the most notorious criminals from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

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