France's far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen has refused to go into a meeting with Lebanon's grand mufti after his aides asked her to wear a headscarf.
Ms Le Pen, who is on a three-day visit to Lebanon and has met senior officials, was scheduled to meet Grand Sunni Muslim Mufti Sheikh Abdel-Latif Derian.
Shortly after she arrived at his office, one of his aides tried to give her a white headscarf to put on, but she refused it.
Ms Le Pen said she had previously met the grand mufti of Egypt's Al-Azhar, one of the world's leading Sunni clerics, without wearing a veil.
She met Grand Imam Ahmed al-Tayeb in 2015 and photos of the meeting show her with the cleric without wearing a veil.
Once she was told that customs are different in Lebanon, Ms Le Pen walked towards her car and left.
The mufti's office issued a statement saying Ms Le Pen was told in advance through one of her aides that she would have to put on a headscarf during the meeting.
"This is the protocol," the statement said.
"The mufti's office regrets this inappropriate behaviour in such meetings."
Ms Le Pen has tried to raise her international profile and press her pro-Christian stance with her visit to Lebanon, a former French protectorate.
On Monday, she met President Michel Aoun and prime minister Saad Hariri, declaring that Syrian President Bashar Assad was "the most reassuring solution for France".
She also said the best way to protect minority Christians is to "eradicate" the Islamic State group, not turn them into refugees.
On Tuesday, after walking away from the meeting with the grand mufti, she said that before it she had told the cleric's office she was not planning to don a veil during the encounter and was not told not to come.
"They didn't cancel the meeting so I thought they would accept the fact that I wouldn't wear one," she said. "They tried to impose it upon me, make it a matter of fact. You can't put me before a matter of fact."
She later met the Maronite patriarch, Bechara Boutros Rai, and Christian right-wing leader Samir Geagea.
Ms Le Pen's refusal to don the headscarf would be in line with her strong support for French secularism, and a proposal in her presidential platform. French law bans headscarves in the public service and for high school pupils.
Her proposal aims to extend a 2004 law banning headscarves and other "ostentatious" religious symbols in classrooms to all public spaces. While the 2004 law covers all religions, it is aimed at Muslims.
Later, a group of Lebanese held a small protest in Beirut against Ms Le Pen's visit. One protester raised a drawing of her between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US leader Donald Trump, with "Neo-fascists" written underneath.
