CAIRO, Egypt (CNN) -- The French government has said it will not revoke a law banning Muslim headscarves in public schools, despite demands by a militant Islamic group holding two French journalists hostage in Iraq.
"The law will be applied," spokesman Jean-Francois Cope told Canal Plus television Monday.
Meanwhile Monday, France's Foreign Minister Michel Barnier visited Egyptian government officials and Arab leaders but said there was no new word on the journalists' fate.
The strangest thing about this whole issue is that I actually agree that France should lift its ban on headscarves. Its a stupid policy. Why can't students wear headscarves in accordance to their cultural beliefs? I really don't see the harm in it.
But now France is put into a position of having to defend a silly policy lest they be seen as weak, terrorist-appeasers in the eyes of the world. And the problem is that human lives are at stake.