May 8, 2003	Thursday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 5, 1424

PARIS, May 7: France new single representative organism for French Muslims, the CFCM (Conseil francais du culte musulman), has decided to set as its first task the formation of imams who are not only French-speaking but who also will be French-bred.

With more than 900 of France’s present 1,000 imams being non-French, and educated abroad, the CFCM says it will begin studying the difficult task of giving the country a training institute, eventually a university, that will produce community leaders who will not only know how to speak French, but also have a basic grasp of French culture and civilization.

For Mr Sarkozy bringing in native-born and French-bred imams should help to counteract what he sees as a growing trend to bring in fundamentalist imams.