There is growing confidence in London that "all sides" are now working positively in an effort to resolve the issue of paramilitary fugitives or "On The Runs" (OTRs).
This became apparent last night as the Sinn Féin president, Mr Gerry Adams, declared himself "comfortable that the issue can be sorted out", while insisting it should be done quickly.
Mr Adams was speaking after hour-long talks with the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, at 10 Downing Street again dominated by the issue of policing in Northern Ireland, and what Mr Adams claimed were "operational links" between British military and intelligence agencies and loyalist paramilitaries.
In a potentially important clarification of Sinn Féin's position, Mr Adams told The Irish Times his party was not seeking a general "amnesty" and acknowledged the Belfast Agreement did not provide for one.
Insisting that the issue had become "a storm in a teacup" seized upon "opportunistically" by the British Conservative Party, Mr Adams said his party's representations concerned only "between 30 and 40 people against whom there are outstanding warrants". Whitehall sources had earlier indicated the numbers involved ran into "triple figures", probably closer to 100 than 200.
Downing Street said there had been "a useful meeting" at which "the Prime Minister reiterated his commitment to resolve the issue (of the OTRs), while recognising the sensitivities involved".
Those sensitivities have grown since that commitment was first jointly made with the Irish Government during last July's Weston Park negotiations.
Mr Adams last night maintained he was seeking to resolve the anomalous position of a "very small number of people".
However, the British government has come under strong pressure also to address the position of hundreds of "exiles" forced to leave Northern Ireland by order of loyalist or republican paramilitaries, and is still considering in "parallel" the position of members of the security forces against whom prosecutions arising from past episodes could still be mounted.
Mr Adams said he had had "a good meeting" in the context of what he had previously described as "a process of engagement" designed to "focus" Mr Blair on allegations of security-force "collusion" with loyalists, and his contention that security agencies in Northern Ireland had enjoyed carte blanche under previous Conservative governments. And he cited "continuing efforts to frustrate the office of the Police Ombudsman" and the "inside job" break-in at the Castlereagh police complex as evidence of continuing attempts by "rejectionists within the (security) system" to undermine the peace process.
Mr Adams suggested the Castlereagh incident had also moved the policing question beyond the realm of party politics, and underlined Sinn Féin's view that an acceptable police force had to be "freed from partisan control" and subject to clear and democratic accountability; be culturally neutral; and operate a "core" human rights ethos within a legal and judicial framework.