British Prime Minister Tony Blair today dismissed comparisons between the IRA and al-Qaeda.
He told his monthly briefing in Downing Street that to compare the two was wrong as their methods and ideologies were completely different.
Tony Blair
"I don't think you can compare the political demands of republicanism with the political demands of this terrorist ideology we're facing now."
He said no government could negotiate with terrorists who were capable of using suicide bombers as weapons to kill indiscriminately, adding that IRA atrocities were never on the same scale as those of Islamic fundamentalists.
"I don't think the IRA would ever have set about trying to kill 3,000 people," he said.
"In America, it could have been 30,000 instead of 3,000 and they would prefer that. My entire thinking changed from 11 September - the belief that you have a different form of terrorism."