Hello everyone,

we'll be leading with another Obama administration U-turn: after blocking the release of suspected Bush-era abuse in American jails abroad, the Obama administraion issued a statement minutes ago confirming that military commissions will be continue to be used to prosecute a small number of terror suspects.

Within hours of taking office, Mister Obama issued executive orders ordering the closure of Guantanamo Bay and the suspension of Military tribunals, pending a 3-month review.

But in a statement today, the president announced:

"Military commissions have a long tradition in the United States. They are appropriate for trying enemies who violate the laws of war, provided that they are properly structured and administered."

We will be taking you live to Washington, D.C. for more on what reforms the U.S. president says are necessary to make these widely criticized commissions fair to those charged with terror offenses.

We'll also be interviewing an ACLU lawyer, who will argue that the tribunals are flawed and tell us why he thinks terror suspects should be tried in the civilian federal courts system.

We will also be reading out results of the poll on whether you, our viewers, think these milittary courts can be fair.

Also today, we'll be looking at the Roxana Saberi case. We will cross live to Vienna, where Saberi landed hours ago, for more on what she told reporters about her release from an Iranian prison.

I'll be chatting with our Chief International correspondent Christiane Amanpour about what Saberi's lawyer says the young Iranian-American journalist was really arrested for last February. There had been reports she was charged with buying alcohol and working in Iran without valid press credentials. It seems some of that may not to be true. We'll have the latest.

We'll be looking at the latest economic meltdown stories today. It was only last week that Wall Street was jumping up and down with joy at the hope the U.S. economy was finally bottoming out. What a difference a week of economic reports makes.

Stephanie Elam will join me from New York for that and more on General Motors swinging the axe at more than a thousand car dealerships. It's was already looking bad for small business owners. We'll talk about the ripple effects of this massive car dealership cull.

That and the rest of the day's top news as always!

See you on TV,

Hala

Posted by: CNN Anchor, Hala Gorani
Filed under: Today At The I-Desk