BUDAPEST, Hungary -- Hungary said Wednesday it will accept a detainee from Guantánamo Bay, becoming another nation agreeing to help President Barack Obama to close the U.S. military detention center.

Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai said Hungary would choose from a short list of Guantánamo prisoners in the coming days and that the released detainee would participate in an 18-month integration program.

"According to our current expectations . . . the chosen candidate will be a Palestinian man who will be able to start a new life in Hungary,'' Bajnai told reporters.

"I ask my fellow citizens to consider the difficult circumstances in which the detainee spent his latest years and help his future integration.''

Bajnai said he had called U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday to inform her of Hungary's decision.

Obama has ordered the facility closed by January 2010, and has pending notifications before Congress of his administration's plan to transfer detainees to Ireland. There are still more than 200 detainees at Guantánamo and foreign nations have been offering assistance.

Last week, a government representative from Estonia also was visiting the prison camps as part of "a thorough analysis'' of wether to resettle a detainee, including "the Estonian legal framework and possible negative effects on the internal security," said Terje Raadik of the Estonian Embassy in Washington D.C.

No timetable had been set for an Estonian decision on whether or how many detainees the nation might offer resettlement.

Estonia was looking at the potential prisoner resettlement issue as part of a European Union resolution to support the closure plan as part of a counter-terror strategy, she said. The EU has each member nation individually negotiate any transfer agreements with the Obama administration.

The Pacific island nation of Palau also recently announced that so far four of the 13 Uighur detainees at Guantánamo have agreed to resettlement there. China has branded the Turkic Muslims from its far western region as terrorist suspects and wants them returned.

Daniel Fried, the U.S. envoy in charge of closing the Guantánamo prison, thanked Hungary and said all detainees who had been included as candidates for resettlement have been cleared of "any residual security questions which may remain.''

"We are very grateful for Hungary's decision,'' Fried told reporters, adding that so far France, Spain, Italy and Belgium were also considering resettling additional detainees.

The Spanish government said last week it was close to deciding how many Guantánamo detainees it will accept.

The European Union has long argued for the prison's closure, but the Obama administration has had trouble convincing some member countries to taking specific prisoners.

Britain has said it wants to limit its intake of ex-Guantánamo prisoners to people with citizenship or residency ties. Others, such as Germany and Sweden, say they have taken many refugees from earlier conflicts and expect the U.S. to explain why it shouldn't be the first option for all of Guantánamo's homeless.

"Closing the Guantánamo detention camp in a way that advances the security of the United States and of our allies as well as advances our values is one of President Obama's great priorities,'' Fried said.

Before the start of the war in Iraq, Hungary hosted a U.S. military training camp for Iraqi exiles and sent 300 noncombat troops to Iraq who carried out mainly transportation duties. The troops were withdrawn at the end of 2006.

Miami Herald correspondent Carol Rosenberg also contributed to this report.

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