Whirlwind Hits Washington As President Obama Starts Work

President Barack Obama devoted his first full day at the White House to ditching in quick succession one discredited Bush administration policy after another - proposing the closure of the Guantánamo Bay prison and offering a new relationship to Iran.

Sitting behind the desk at the Oval Office at 8.35am after a late night of inauguration balls, he set about trying to live up to the daunting expectations for his presidency both at home and abroad.

He called together his generals to set new missions for Iraq and Afghanistan and gathered his economics team to review measures to confront the deepening recession. He also telephoned world leaders to demonstrate that there is a new president in charge, one with a completely different agenda and different world outlook.

Although Obama's team is reluctant to be compared with Franklin Roosevelt's famous 100 days that brought in the New Deal - the measurement for all subsequent presidencies - it wants his 100 days to be just as historically significant.

Addressing assembled White House staff, he said he had been inspired by the sight of the estimated two million who gathered to watch him being sworn in. Life in the White House from now on would not be business as usual, he said. He told staff he expected a higher ethical code than had existed under his predecessor, and issued executive orders imposing strict rules governing dealings with Washington's army of lobbyists. "Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency," he said.

He also issued a pay freeze on senior staff earning more than $100,000. "Families are tightening their belts and so should Washington," he said.

The most symbolically significant act of his first day was to release a draft executive order for the closure within a year of Guantánamo, site of torture and other human rights abuses that came to define the Bush administration. The draft executive order, which Obama is expected to sign later this week, says: "The detention facilities at Guantánamo for individuals covered by this order shall be closed as soon as practicable, and no later than one year from the date of this order."

He also ordered judges to suspend trials under way there for at least the next 120 days, and they quickly complied.

The most important meeting of the day was his calling together of his generals. He wants to fulfil campaign promises to withdraw US troops from Iraq within his first 18 months in office, and to send new troops to Afghanistan. His top commander, General David Petraeus, flew back from Afghanistan to be present.

On the international front, Obama's team posted on the White House website a new direction for foreign policy, of which the most startling was an offer to negotiate with Iran. Although such a policy was a prominent feature of his campaign message of engagement with America's enemies, the White House said such negotiations would be "without preconditions".

Hillary Clinton, who has today been confirmed by the Senate as the next secretary of state, had warned Obama during her battle for the Democratic presidential nomination that it would be a mistake to sit down with the Iranians without first setting conditions.

The Bush administration had refused to negotiate with Iran until it first suspended its uranium enrichment programme, suspected by the west as a move to secure a nuclear weapons capability.

On the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, after weeks of frustrating silence on the part of Obama, the new president made a point of ensuring that his first phone calls to world leaders were to key players in the region. He spoke to the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, and King Abdullah of Jordan.

Although no shift in policy was signalled, the fact that he called them first suggests that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will be a priority for his administration, in contrast with Bush, who was initially reluctant to become involved.

The White House spokesman, Robert Gibbs, said afterwards: "Obama reiterated that he and his administration will work in full partnership with President Abbas to achieve peace in the region."

Some members of Obama's team are known to be privately angry with Israel over the death toll and level of destruction in Gaza, despite Obama's expression of sympathy for Israel over Palestinian rocket attacks.

As well as meeting military leaders, the president called together his economics team for the first time in the White House to discuss the $800bn spending package he is proposing to kick-start the economy with. They have to decide whether the money will be enough, given the depth of the recession.

Republicans in Congress are already hinting that they are prepared to fight against the package.