Hillary Clinton has been caught out “mis-speaking” again in a manner that suggests that she hasn’t learnt from past experiences of her globe-trotting, “lily-gilding” speeches.

The US Secretary of State was exposed during her battle with Barack Obama to become the Democratic presidential nominee over her claims to have landed in Bosnia under sniper fire.

She was even described as “a wee bit silly” for claiming greater credit than was her due for the Irish peace process, having made several visits to Northern Ireland as First Lady.

She was back in Belfast last week, giving a gentle push to politicians dragging their heels over a final piece in the peace process jigsaw.

But according to the Sunday Life newspaper, during a speech she made to the Stormont parliament she said that Belfast’s landmark Europa Hotel was devastated by an explosion when she first stayed there in 1995.

The Europa, where most journalists covering the decades-long conflict stayed, was famed as Europe’s most bombed hotel, earning the moniker “the Hardboard Hotel”.

However, the last Provisional IRA bomb to damage the Europa was detonated in 1993, two years before President Clinton and his wife checked in for the night.

The last time the Europa underwent renovations because of bomb blast damage was in January 1994, 22 months before the presidential entourage booked 110 rooms at the hotel.

Mrs Clinton told assembled politicians at Stormont: “When Bill and I first came to Belfast we stayed at the Europa Hotel ... even though then there were sections boarded up because of damage from bombs.”

During the presidential campaign Mrs Clinton drew on her Bosnia experience, saying: ”I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport but we just ran with our heads down to get in the vehicles to get to our base.”

After archive news footage was shown of her walking calmly from her plane with her daughter, Chelsea, Ms Clinton admitted: ”I did mis-speak the other day.

“This has been a very long campaign. Last week, for the first time in 12 years or so, I mis-spoke.”

A spokesman for Mrs Clinton said that she had simply been trying to express a sincere “perception” of a Belfast in darker days.

The spokesman told a Belfast newspaper: “We are not talking about the same thing [as ‘mis-speaking’ about Bosnia]. Secretary Clinton was simply contrasting.”

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