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Obama admits Guantanamo won't close by Jan. deadline
President Obama directly acknowledged for the first time Wednesday that the prison facility at Guantanamo Bay will not close by the January deadline he set, but he said he hoped to still achieve that goal sometime next year.
Obama refused, however, to set a new deadline.
In an interview in the Chinese capital with Major Garrett of Fox News, Obama said he was "not disappointed" that the Guantanamo deadline had slipped, saying he "knew this was going to be hard."
"People, I think understandably, are fearful after a lot of years where they were told that Guantanamo was critical to keep terrorists out," Obama said. Closing the facility, he added, is "also just technically hard."