France may ban foreign financing of mosques

France's prime minister yesterday said he would consider a temporary ban on foreign financing of mosques, urging a "new model" for relations with Islam after a spate of jihadist attacks.

Manuel Valls, under fire for perceived security lapses around the attacks, also admitted a "failure" in the fact that one of the jihadists who stormed a church and killed a priest on Tuesday had been released with an electronic tag pending trial.

In an interview with French daily Le Monde, Valls said he was "open to the idea that -- for a period yet to be determined -- there should be no financing from abroad for the construction of mosques."

The Socialist prime minister also called for imams to be "trained in France, not elsewhere."

He said Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve, whose portfolio also includes religious affairs, was working on building a "new model" for France's relations with Islam.

And Salafism -- the deeply fundamentalist branch of Islam espoused by many jihadists -- "has no place in France," Valls said.

France has just over 2,000 mosques, for one of Europe's largest Muslim populations which numbers around five million.

Some large mosques have been financed by Saudi Arabia and other Gulf or Northern African countries, according to local media reports.

The government has faced tough questions since it emerged that both church attackers had been on the radar of intelligence services and had tried to go to Syria.

The church attack came as the government was already facing a firestorm of criticism over alleged security failings after the Bastille Day truck massacre in Nice that left 84 people dead two weeks ago.

In the government's first admission of a lapse since the two attacks, Valls acknowledged Kermiche's liberty was a "failure, it has to be recognised", adding that judges needed to take a "different, case-by-case, approach, given the jihadists' very advanced concealment methods".