Niqabs, like this one worn by Farhat Mirza, vice-president of the Council for the Advancement of Muslim Professionals in Montreal, have been controversial in Egypt, where the government is attempting to restrict their use in schools. (Peter Mccabe/Canadian Press)

Egypt's highest Muslim authority said he plans to bar female students who wear face veils from entering the schools of al-Azhar, Sunni Islam's premier institute of learning, according to local reports.

Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi, Sheik of al-Azhar, made his plans public during a weekend visit to a Cairo school, where he told a middle school student to take off her niqab, according to the independent daily Al-Masry Al-Youm.

The niqab, a face-veil with a thin opening for the eyes, "has nothing to do with Islam and is only a custom," Tantawi is quoted as saying.

While most women in Egypt wear a head scarf, only a few wear the niqab, which is more common in neighbouring Saudi Arabia.

A security official also told The Associated Press on Monday that police have standing verbal orders to prohibit girls covered head to toe from entering al-Azhar's institutions, which include middle schools, high schools and several universities.

The move appears to be a crackdown on overt manifestations of ultraconservative Islam in Egypt.

Tantawi's office was unavailable for comment, but Abdel Moati Bayoumi, a scholar in an al-Azhar affiliated research centre, said al-Azhar's scholars would back Tantawi if he issued the order.

Past efforts to restrict dress unsuccessful

"We all agree that niqab is not a religious requirement," Bayoumi said.

"Taliban forces women to wear the niqab. ... The phenomena is spreading" and it has to be confronted, he added. "The time has come."

Previous efforts in Egypt to limit the use of the niqab have been mostly unsuccessful.

In 2001 Egypt's supreme court ruled in favour of a researcher wearing a niqab who was prevented from using a university library, with the court calling a total ban on the dress unconstitutional.

But it recommended women wearing the garb be made to uncover their faces for security guards.

A ban on nurses wearing full veil, which was announced in 2008, has also not been enforced.

The niqab has been controversial in Canada as well, with the federal Conservatives introducing a bill in 2007 that would have forced veiled women to show their faces when voting.

But earlier this year Steven Fletcher, minister of state for democratic reform, said the government had no plans to go forward with the legislation because of other priorities.

With files from the Associated Press