In a 500-page report released on Thursday, a government-appointed "catastrophe commission" lambasted the government for "lacking organization to handle serious crises", laying the blame primarily on Persson and Foreign Minister Laila Freivalds.

As many as 20,000 Swedes were holidaying in Southeast Asia at the time of the December 26 Indian Ocean tsunami, most of them in Thailand.

In the first days after the disaster the government failed to realize the scope of the tragedy and did not offer injured Swedes medical care, transport home or other assistance.

"Never before has a Swedish prime minister and his government received such sharp criticism as that handed down by the catastrophe commission," Sweden's paper of record, the liberal Dagens Nyheter, wrote in an editorial on Friday.

While the newspaper questioned the government's ability to run the country, it stopped short of calling for Persson's resignation.

However, regional dailies Upsala Nya Tidning and Norrbotten-Kuriren urged Persson to step down, while the mass-circulation national daily Expressen said Freivalds should leave her post.

The country's second-largest morning paper, the conservative Svenska Dagbladet, criticized Persson for centralizing power to his office during his eight years in power and then doing nothing during the tsunami crisis.

It said his fate would be decided by Swedish voters in the country's general election in September 2006.

In the report, Persson was found to have the ultimate responsibility for his administration's shortcomings, but Freivalds received the harshest criticism.

She was slammed for going to the theater on the evening of December 26, as reports emerged of thousands of missing Swedes in the areas hit by the tsunami.

Persson has so far insisted there is no reason for anyone in his administration to resign.

"I don't believe that it would soothe the suffering of a single individual to fire someone," he said on Thursday.

The centre-right opposition said Thursday it would not call for a vote of no-confidence and would instead focus on the upcoming election campaign.

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