The proposal was supported by the coalition and opposition deputies except for the opposition Hungarian Coalition Party (SMK).

The Czech lower house passed a similar resolution in April 2002.

The Slovak resolution, rejecting any challenging of the post-war decrees or legal and property relations ensuing from them, was formulated by four deputies for the junior ruling Slovak National Party (SNS) with SNS chairman Jan Slota at the head.

The deputies for the senior opposition Slovak Democratic and Christian Union (SDKU-DS) asserted during the previous parliamentary debate that the resolution amounts to "breaking into an open door."

The SDKU-DS, nevertheless, voted in support of the resolution on both the parliamentary committee level and at the plenary session today.

The SMK, which represents the 500,000-strong Hungarian minority in 5-million Slovakia, is sharply opposed to the resolution.

The SMK even recently called on Bratislava to compensate Slovak Hungarians for the consequences of the post-war developments, but the ethnic Slovak parties swept the proposal off the table.

The SMK is also unlikely to succeed with its new idea of a joint declaration in which the Slovak and Hungarian parliaments would express regret at mutual historical wrongs.

The Czechoslovak post-war decrees, which some dub Benes decrees after then president Edvard Benes, among others stripped ethnic Germans and Hungarians of their civic and property rights. Unlike ethnic Germans, who were transferred mainly from the Czech Lands, most Hungarians were allowed to stay in Slovakia and they eventually reacquired their civic rights.