Senior Sinn Fein figures are expected to have further meetings with United States government officials to clarify the party's position on the arrest of three Irishmen in Colombia.
More information emerged from Bogota yesterday about the backgrounds to the arrests of the three men and details of previous visits to Latin America.
According to reports in Colombia, one of the three men, Mr James Monaghan, also visited Venezuela and Puerto Rica in the past year. Mr Martin McCauley was said to have previously visited Colombia. Mr Niall Connolly, who is from Dublin, has been living in Cuba for a number of years.
All three deny they were involved in training members of the Marxist guerrilla movement, FARC. They admit travelling on forged passports.
Sinn Fein has denied the men are members, although Mr McCauley and Mr Monaghan were formerly prominent figures in the party. Sinn Fein also denies the statement by the Cuban government that Mr Connolly was accredited as Sinn Fein's representative in the country.
A spokesman for the US State Department, Mr Philip Reeker, told a press conference in Washington on Wednesday that the Department was closely monitoring developments in Colombia and was "greatly concerned" about alleged collaboration between FARC and the IRA.
Mr Reeker said: "No one should be in any doubt that the United States would be greatly concerned about any assistance, information-sharing, training or collaboration with the FARC, which is a terrorist organisation, so designated under our law. It is a major contributor to the flow of illegal narcotics into the United States, and an organisation which has kidnapped and murdered US citizens.
"We have been in touch with Sinn Fein on this subject. We will continue to monitor the situation closely. But I think all I can reiterate is that no one should have any doubts about the seriousness with which we would take collaboration with the FARC by any individual or organisation.
"The situation at hand is one where we have to have facts established, and that is why we will continue to monitor it.
"This [FARC] is a terrorist organisation. It is designated as such, and there is quite an explanation as to why in our Patterns of Global Terrorism Report." Mr Reeker said collaboration with a terrorist group was designated under US law and "is of great concern to us".
On Wednesday, Sinn Fein spokesman Mr Mitchel McLaughlin said the party had given a satisfactory account of its position on Colombia to the US government. He would be meeting US officials following the meeting earlier this week between Ms Rita O'Hare of Sinn Fein and officials in the US embassy in Dublin.
Mr McLaughlin said the party has "demonstrated to the satisfaction of the American authorities" that it continues to support the peace process and is "confident that we can resolve the outstanding problems".
The British embassy in Dublin yesterday pointed out that the visits to Colombia by British military figures over the past year was part of an EU-supported programme to help the Colombian Government. The EU programme in Colombia is headed by the former Northern Secretary, Dr Mowlam.
On April 30th this year, the EU pledged to contribute some #330 million to support the peace process in Colombia over the period 2001-06. The European package places particular importance on measures to support the rule of law, protect human rights and assist the victims of violence.
Dr Mowlam visited Colombia three times in nine months to help advance the peace process.