The sex scandal involving U.S. Secret Service agents escalated with the disclosure that at least 20 women had been in hotel rooms with U.S. advance team just before President Barack Obama's visit to Colombia last week, according to U.S. congressional officials as quoted by media reports Wednesday.

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), who was briefed by Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan, told reporters that "20 or 21 foreign women were brought" to the Hotel Caribe in Cartagena, where the Secret Service and other members of the advance team were staying.

Sullivan said the 11 Secret Service agents and 10 military personnel under investigation were telling different stories about who the women were, adding none of the women, who had to surrender their IDs at the hotel, were minors.

Sullivan has dispatched more investigators to Colombia to interview the women, said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee.

"Some are admitting (the women) were prostitutes; others are saying they're not, they're just women they met at the hotesdayl bar," King said，adding "but prostitutes or not, to be bringing a foreign national back into a secure zone is a problem."

The agents and military members were part of a larger team of Americans sent to Cartagena to help secure government buildings and other facilities before Obama arrived to attend the Summit of the Americas, a gathering of regional leaders.

The Secret Service flew the 11 agents home last Thursday, a day before Obama arrived, after an agent's dispute with a prostitute drew local police and the U.S. Embassy was alerted.

The number of women involved in the affair was not previously known.

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