"Vesely, chairman of the Romany association Dzeno and deputy chairman of the government council for Romany community affairs, said he was not considering apologising to Cunek.

Vesely said on Tuesday Cunek's proposal was reminiscent of the steps taken by the Bolshevik rule and war-time Slovakia.

"We see it as an example of usual practice from Cunek's clerofascist workshop," Vesely said.

Cunek has worked out a plan that reckons with Romany families in the country being divided into three groups according to their social level, each approached in a different way.

The first group will comprise the families that live almost independent from the social allowance system.

The second group is to comprise those abusing social allowances.

The third group are the Romanies who have to be supervised always and everywhere. Romanies in this group should be moved to hostels with a strict regime and under social workers' supervision.

Vesely said the effort to divide people according to their origin was unacceptable and prompted Holocaust associations among many Romanies.

Most Central European Romanies perished in extermination camps during World War Two.

Cunek unveiled his plan to the Romany members of the government council for Romany community affairs last week.

"Vesely voiced no serious reservations about the concept and said it was a good basis for further discussion," Cunek said, adding that Vesely was now behaving like a coward.

"He is evidently unable to conduct an open and professional discussion. If it suits him, he is ready to use quite preposterous arguments to draw attention to him," Cunek said.

"If Vesely has some remnants of decency and honour, he should publicly apologise not only to me, but, above all, to those who used their rich experiences when drafting the concept," said Cunek with whom Romany activists from Romany ghettoes cooperated on the project.

"I'm not ready to apologise," Vesely said, adding that he was not against a professional discussion with Cunek.

"However, a discussion on the issue is not conducted through the media if we are employed in the civil service and if the document is still preliminary," Vesely said.

Cunek published a preliminary version of his plan at the webpage of the Local and Development Ministry on Tuesday.

Some Romany activists are of the view that Cunek's current effort was merely a part of the campaign before the October regional and Senate elections.

"Fewer than one month ahead of the elections, Cunek is using again the Romany issue," Zdenek Rysavy, from the civic group Romea, told CTK on Tuesday.

Some observers say Cunek, a former mayor of Vsetin, north Moravia, owes his swift ascent in politics to his having evicted a number of Romany rent-defaulters out of the town centre and outside the town in the mid-2000s."