European Union lawmakers on Monday condemned Italian plans to fingerprint tens of thousands of Gypsy adults and children, calling it a discriminatory action that smacked of Nazi Germany.

Legislators called for an EU-wide policy that would help integrate Gypsies into mainstream society.

Italian Interior Minister Roberto Maroni, a member of the anti-immigrant Northern League party, said last week that fingerprinting was needed to fight crime and identify illegal immigrants for expulsion. Italian officials have been blaming Gypsies for rising crime.

Members of the European Parliament said the plan smacked of Nazi methods.

“We are extremely startled by the recent measures announced by the Italian government. Fingerprinting adults and minors is discriminatory and goes against certain agreed principles,” Dutch lawmaker Jan Marinus Wiersma said.

EU Social Affairs Commissioner Vladimir Spidla, the bloc’s top anti-discrimination official, said fingerprinting one ethnic group was “not acceptable.”

Spidla said he had “certain doubts about the nature of the procedure and its extent” and had requested clarification from Italy about why it was fingerprinting Gypsies.

Maroni said Monday during a meeting of EU interior ministers in Cannes, France, that Italy would provide the EU with a report on the government’s actions toward Gypsies by the end of July.