France has reached out to soothe the delicate feelings of the Muslim community, after committing the almost unforgivable transgression of deporting an imam who preached wife beating: France reassures Muslims.

Jean-Pierre Raffarin, the French prime minister, reassured the leader of the country’s Muslims yesterday of his government’s respect for Islam following the recent crackdown on imams.

Dalil Boubakeur, the head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith, said Mr Raffarin had told him the expulsion of five suspected radical imams in the past four months “did not reflect any hostility” towards France’s 5 million Muslims, the largest community in Europe.

In return Mr Boubakeur promised to improve training for Islamic clerics and to draw up a list of authorised imams.

According to the interior ministry 10% of France’s 1,000-1,500 imams are citizens, less than half speak French and many are illegal immigrants.

Mr Boubakeur, who asked for the meeting last week after accusing the media of portraying France’s imams as “a horde of foreign mercenaries without the slightest regard for the rule of law”, said the biggest problem was “to ensure [imams] don’t mix religion and politics”.

He said yesterday: “Eighty percent of imams in France match the criteria recognised by Islam but there are a minority which I believe are not worthy of their mission.”

Elsewhere in France, the port of Honfleur seems to have “misplaced” 1,100 pounds of ammonium nitrate fertilizer: Fertilizer Stolen From Port in France.

HONFLEUR, France - A bag containing 1,100 pounds of ammonium nitrate fertilizer, which can be used to make powerful bombs, was stolen from this western French port over Easter weekend, officials said Tuesday.

Europe-1 radio reported that police are focusing on the Spanish Basque separatist group ETA as being behind the theft during April 10-11.

“The bag of fertilizer was stocked without surveillance on a quay of the port,” said an official at the Honfleur port office, who asked not to be identified.

Ammonium nitrate is a common fertilizer but has been used in major terror attacks, including bombings on the resort island of Bali in 2002 and in Oklahoma City in 1995.