The Provisional IRA has dismissed allegations that it has reneged on its promise to decommission and held on to some of its arsenal as "politically motivated".
The Independent International Commission on Decommissioning (IICD) said in a report published today that it was informed last week by "security sources in Northern Ireland" that they had intelligence suggesting some individuals in the IRA had retained a "range of arms including handguns".
The PIRA dismissed the claims as false in a statement released this afternoon.
"Recent allegations that the IRA is in breach of its public commitments are false," the statement, attributed to the Provisionals' pen-name P O'Neill, said. "The IRA has honoured all public commitments made on July 28, 2005. Any allegations to the contrary are politically motivated."
In its report published earlier, the IICD said it believed the allegations were untrue, noting that "none of various intelligence assessments " suggest the IRA leadership is moving away from its commitment to end its armed struggle.
It said it had discussed the allegations with the Garda Siochana, who said "reliable sources" had produced no intelligence suggesting any arms have been retained.
The report detailed two meetings between the IICD and IRA representatives last week.
"In our first meeting last week the IRA representative confirmed that the leadership remains committed to its statement of July 28th," according to the IICD report. "He re-iterated that all the arms that were dumped following that statement were then collected and put beyond use in September under our supervision. He assured us that no IRA arms had been retained or placed in long-term hides.
"In a meeting later in the week, the representative said each IRA commander had been questioned about the reports and they confirmed that all arms under their control had been destroyed," it continued.
"We are reassured by the fact that none of the various intelligence assessments suggest the IRA leadership is moving away from its July 28 commitments," the IICD added. "We conclude that in the absence of evidence to the contrary our September 26th assessment regarding IRA arms remains correct".