Two French police reports call the use of the burqa a "marginal phenomenon," saying that fewer than 400 women in the country wear the all-covering Muslim robe, a French newspaper reported Wednesday.

The burqa is a hot-button issue in France, a secular state where wearing explicitly religious symbols in public places like schools is tightly regulated.

French lawmakers recently revived the long-standing debate about whether Muslim veils are acceptable in public by proposing a ban of the face- and body-covering burqa.

President Nicolas Sarkozy, a conservative, appeared to support the proposal, saying in June that burqas make women prisoners and that they would not be tolerated in France.

The Le Monde newspaper said the two reports by police intelligence agencies were given to the government, which is investigating the extent of burqa wear in France. One of the reports, based on surveillance, estimated some 367 women in France regularly wear the burqa, according to Le Monde. A decade ago, burqas were virtually unheard of in France, it said.

Most of those wearing burqas _ mostly women under 30 _ do so voluntarily, one police report found.

France is home to western Europe's largest population of Muslims, estimated at 5 million out of a total population of 63 million.

A 2004 law banning the wear of Muslim head scarves at schools sparked fierce debate and some friction with the French Muslim community. The 2004 legislation also banned Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crosses in public schools.