Sinn Fein leader Mr Gerry Adams declared today that the hijackers who slammed airliners into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were terrorists, but members of the IRA were not.
"The IRA is not a terrorist organization," Mr Adams told a news conference before meeting Canadian Prime Minister Mr Jean Chretien.
"The name terrorist is bandied about willy-nilly. Clearly what happened in the USA recently was a terrorist act where civilians were deliberately targeted."
Mr Adams said former South African president Mr Nelson Mandela, former Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin and former US president George Washington were all called terrorists in their day.
"I'm quite prepared to discuss the issue of terrorism vs. patriotism, and who's a freedom fighter and who's a terrorist, but I think really the focus has to be upon building uniquely in our country a dispensation in which violence of any kind is a thing of the past," he said.
Canada's spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), listed the IRA in a May 2000 report as one of 50 groups targeted by its counter-terrorism program.
Mr Chretien told reporters, before meeting Mr Adams, that Mr Adams was welcome in Canada.
"I'm happy that he's here because he's an elected person, and he has renounced terrorism, and he is elected there and he has made a contribution lately to bring back a government in Northern Ireland," Mr Chretien said.
"I want to encourage him to continue along the lines that he's been working on. He's certainly been an instrument in persuading people to lay down their arms."
The IRA agreed two weeks ago to begin disarming, dismantling part of its vast arsenal of assault rifles, plastics explosives, handguns and bomb timers.
"I certainly hope he will continue to work towards the establishment of a government in Northern Ireland," Mr Chretien said.
In the wake of the September 11th attacks on the United States, Mr Chretien's government is pushing forward a sweeping anti-terrorism bill that defines terrorist activities and groups and bans fund-raising for terrorist groups.
Mr Adams, who on Saturday helped launch the fund-raising group Friends of Sinn Fein Canada, said his own description of terrorism was clear: "I define terrorism as the deliberate targeting of civilians.
"In any war terrible things were done," he said. "In my view the IRA has never deliberately targeted civilians."
Pressed on whether the IRA had never placed bombs in shopping districts, he said: "Well, it depends, it depends, you see."
He then added: "It's quite academic. You miss the point. The point is we have a peace process, and part of the trick - if I can use that word - of getting the peace process to work is that people stop demonizing each other."