Nationalist tensions between Hungary and Slovakia are running high after violent clashes between rival supporters erupted at a weekend football match.

Around 50 fans were injured when fighting erupted after the game which the local Hungarian minority team lost 4-0 in the Slovak town of Dunjaska Streda on Saturday.

In Budapest, Hungarians burned Slovakian flags and Slovakian-language street signs in two Hungarian villages close to the border were daubed with paint.

In Dunjaska Streda, where Hungarians make up about 10 percent of the population, 31 people were arrested, half of them belonging to the ethnic Hungarian minority.

Both capitals condemned the incidents, but each blamed the other for fanning ultra-nationalist sentiment.

The Slovakian Foreign Affairs Ministry said: `It`s regrettable that extremists are using the events in Dunajska Streda as a pretext.

`It`s deplorable that the Hungarian government did not take any effective measures to stamp out these activities.`

Budapest, for its part, has called for an enquiry to establish whether police intervention at the match was `proportional` to the incidents.

Slovakia`s deputy prime minister, Dusan Caplovic, who attended the match, said it was fans from the Budapest club Ferencvaros -- who had come to support the Hungarian minority`s team -- that started the stone-throwing.

`Hungarians beaten while police sow terror in Slovakia` ran the front page of the Hungarian daily Magyar Nemzet on Monday.

The newspaper cited amateur video footage posted on the Internet as `proof` of their claim.

Tensions between Hungary and Slovakia go back a lot farther than this weekend.

The Hungarians argue that the presence of the xenophobic party of Jan Slota in the government of Social Democrat Prime Minister Robert Fico has helped aggravate the situation ever since the two parties formed a coalition in July 2006.

Angered by what he perceives to be separatist tendencies in Slovakia`s Hungarian population, Jan Slota has used increasingly aggressive language in recent weeks, even comparing Hungary`s Foreign Affairs Minister Kinga Goncz to Adolf Hitler.

Slovak premier Robert Fico has distanced himself from Slota but Budapest argues Fico is politically responsible for the parties in his coalition and any statements made by party leaders.

New geography school books were recently published in Slovakia which do not contain the Hungarian versions of place-names along the border.

In the ensuing uproar, Hungarian foreign minister Goncz accused the Slovakian side of `violating its promise to respect the status quo of minorities`.

She also complained that Hungarian schools in Slovakia were being discriminated against, `having practically no access to European development funds`.

Slovakian premier Fico rejected such criticisms, saying he saw no reason to withdraw the offending school books and hitting out at Budapest`s interference in Slovakia`s domestic affairs.

Last week, however, the party of the Hungarian minority in Slovakia, SMK, succeeded in reopening the debate on the matter in parliament.

On Wednesday, the prime ministers of Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia are set to meet in Warsaw. The meeting will provide an opportunity for Fico to talk with his Hungarian counterpart Ferenc Gyurcsany about the situation.

`I want to prevent at all costs Hungary`s contemporary history from being dictated by extremists and nationalists, as that would not be in the interests of either country,` Gyurcsany said Monday.