German ECB member: No eurozone inflation risk

A senior official of the European Central Bank said Sunday he saw no risk of inflation rising in the 17-member eurozone in spite of the current debt crisis. "I don't see an increased risk of the currency depreciating," executive ECB board member Joerg Asmussen told the weekly Bild am Sonntag. Asmussen said ECB forecasts acted on the assumption that "inflation will again fall below two percent next year". The ECB also guarantees that the euro will be a stable currency in the future, he added. "Nobody should worry about that," Asmussen said, adding that since the introduction of the single currency in 2002 eurozone inflation had been hovering around two percent. Inflation in Germany where EU steps taken to help struggling eurozone members, including the ECB's bond-buying policy, are not widely accepted, inflation stands at 1.6 percent, he told Bild am Sonntag.  "This is less than at the time of the deutschmark," he added. Higher eurozone inflation in September of 2.7 percent from 2.6 percent in August was due to rising energy prices. Asmussen spoke amid fears in Germany that the rescue of the euro could lead to spiralling inflation.