Sinn Féin response: Sinn Féin's chief negotiator Mr Martin McGuinness has stated that the IRA was not behind the £26.5 million Northern Bank robbery and challenged PSNI Chief Constable Hugh Orde to provide evidence to back his claim blaming Provisional republicans.
Mr McGuinness expressed confidence that no member of the IRA, either acting individually or under the authorisation of the IRA, was involved.
When asked did Mr Orde "make up" his claim blaming the IRA, Mr McGuinness replied: "What I say to that is, produce the evidence, and I think that is a fair question to ask.
"Hugh Orde's comments are nothing more than allegations and politically biased allegations at that. He has not produced one scrap of evidence and those tempted to think that an allegation equals evidence should re-evaluate what justice is all about," said Mr McGuinness.
"Within days of the robbery at the Northern Bank, and following media speculation and PSNI briefings, which suggested IRA involvement, I went to the IRA and asked them about this and was assured that they were not involved," he added.
"I believe we are witnessing a renewed attempt to undermine the peace process. We all need to think long and hard about who is setting this agenda and why. This is more about halting the process of change which Sinn Féin has been driving forward than with anything that happened at the Northern Bank," Mr McGuinness said.
Asked what he thought of an organisation that abducted and threatened two families and robbed £26.5 million, Mr McGuinness responded: "I am horrified at any family being put through any sort of an ordeal like that. Sinn Féin, under no circumstances, would condone that type of behaviour." He said Sinn Féin would resist any attempts to isolate the party and again blamed "securocrats" for attempting to politically damage Sinn Féin.
"The campaigns to smash Sinn Féin, to criminalise and marginalise the republican struggle all failed. We represent the majority of nationalists in the North and the securocrats and the DUP need to come to terms with this political reality," he said.
He said a senior Northern Ireland Office official was fond of briefing people in the US that the British government's goal was to prevent Sinn Féin from becoming the largest party in the North.
Mr McGuinness also alleged that the Northern Secretary, Mr Paul Murphy, on a current trip to the US privately briefed people in Boston that the Sinn Féin vote was on loan and that "once people see what Sinn Féin is really about it will disappear and it will be the same in the South".
Responding, Mr Murphy said Mr McGuinness's comments were an attempt to create a "diversion" from the robbery, and that in his comments in Boston he was quoting a third party, and that "every party's vote is on loan".