A leading cardinal yesterday backed allowing Muslim pupils in Italy to study the Koran in state schools, in the Vatican's latest gesture of concern for good relations with Islam. Cardinal Renato Martino said he agreed with a proposal by an Italian Muslim umbrella group, saying it was only fair as the number of non-Catholic children in the country was growing.

"If there is a need. If in a school there are 100 children of the Islamic religion, I don't see why they can't be taught their religion," he told a conference in Rome.

Cardinal Martino heads the Vatican's department on Justice and Peace and is one of the most influential people in the Holy See. The Vatican's views on issues such as religious education can have great influence on Italian political decisions.

A Muslim group recently asked the Education Ministry to arrange for Muslim students to be taught their religion for an hour a week in public schools. Catholic pupils who do not attend Church schools have such an arrangement.

Muslim groups estimate that there are about 1.2 million Muslims out of a population of about 57 million in Italy but there is no reliable estimate of the number of Muslim children in state schools.

Cardinal Martino said that if Italy made it easier for Muslim children to study religion it would be easier for Christians living in some Islamic countries to ask for reciprocity. Some conservative Catholics disagreed. Leading Catholic writer Vittorio Messori told a national newspaper the proposal was "absurd", branding it as "just a dangerous and confused mix of political correctness".

Muslims in Italy, most from north Africa, generally keep a very low profile. There have been no significant protests in Italy over the publication of cartoons of the prophet Mohammad.