(BRUSSELS) - The European Commission ruled Thursday that Italy had not sought to collect data about people's ethnic origin or religion with its controversial scheme to fingerprint gypsies without identity papers.

A commission spokesman said a report from the Italian authorities showed that nothing in the plan and the way it was carried out "authorises the collection of data relating to ethnic origin or the religion of people."

EU Justice Commissioner Jacques Barrot demanded the report after Italian Interior Minister Roberto Maroni said that Roma gypsies and their children would be fingerprinted "to prevent phenomena such as begging."

The minister responded by saying the Commission's ruling was "highly satisfying, and is fair after all the accusations and insults we have received over the past few months."

"Today the European Commission informed us that our measures are not discriminatory and in line with European standards," Maroni told Italy's news agency ANSA.

Maroni, a member of the right-wing Northern League party in Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right coalition, said the fingerprinting of gypsies would be concluded before the middle of October.

"The use of fingerprinting is not systematic, it is rather limited," said the commission spokesman on justice issues, Michele Cercone.

He said the report, submitted at the end of July, showed that children were only fingerprinted as a last resort, when no other means of establishing their identity was available.

He said cooperation between Brussels and Rome had allowed them to "correct any disposition or measure that could be contested" in the plan, but he did not provide details.

Maroni's plan angered rights and religious groups, who expressed concern that troubling ethnic and religious details are being gathered from the gypsies, usually from their camps around major cities.

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