'We Cannot Accept To Have In Our Country Women Who Are Prisoners Behind Netting'

Oh my. Nicolas Sarkozy better watch out or someone will call him a right-wing extremist.

In comments which will reignite the debate about religious clothing in the country, he said the full-body garment was "not a sign of religion, it is a sign of subservience".

Mr Sarkozy used the first presidential address to a joint session of France's two houses of parliament in 136 years to declare his support for a ban, even before hearing from a parliamentary commission set up to study the issue.

"We cannot accept to have in our country women who are prisoners behind netting, cut off from all social life, deprived of identity," Mr Sarkozy told the special session in Versailles.

"That is not the idea that the French republic has of women's dignity.

"The burka is not a sign of religion, it is a sign of subservience. It will not be welcome on the territory of the French republic," the French president said.

A group of 58 MPs from the Left and Right has called on Parliament to take action against women adopting what they called oppressive head-to-toe Islamic dress that "breaches individual freedoms".

André Gerin, a Communist MP, led the motion for the latest inquiry, calling the burqa and niqab "a moving prison" for women.

Women's rights campaigners, including some Islamic groups, have backed the calls for measures to curb the small but growing trend of wearing burqas among France's five million Muslims.

Fadela Amara, a rights campaigner of Algerian background, who is the Housing Minister, said that was alarmed by the number of women "who are being put in this kind of tomb".

She added: "We must do everything to stop burqas from spreading."

Naturally, the Ice Cream Man has no problem with these moving prisons.

President Barack Obama attacked European laws on religious clothing in a speech in Cairo last week in which he said that the United States prized freedom of religion and would not "tell people what to wear".

Mr Sarkozy responded by telling Mr Obama in Normandy earlier this month that French principles of equality meant that people should not display religious affiliation in state institutions.

I never thought I'd see the day when I had more respect for the president of France than I do for the President of the United States.

Geez, even a Communist MP is on the right side of the issue. Yet Obama, who wants to dictate every aspect of our lives, has no problem apparently with women being kept subservient.