ECB chief says got positive feedback on rate rise

European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet on Sunday fended off French criticism of the ECB's interest rate rise saying he had received positive feedback on its first rate hike in more than a year.
A day after French President Nicolas Sarkozy asked whether it was "reasonable" for the ECB to have raised euro zone rates to 4.25 percent from 4.0 percent when US interest rates were at 2 percent, Trichet said others had responded more favourably.
"I have had a lot of positive remarks" on the rate rise which the ECB announced on Thursday, he told an conference in Aix-en-Provence, without specifying the source of the comments.
European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso on Friday backed the ECB move and even Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who has often criticised the ECB in the past, said on Saturday the ECB was right to have raised rates to fight inflation.
Trichet told the conference the central bank had acted in the public interest and in line with its mandate of ensuring price stability. "The last European Commission survey showed prices were the primary concern of our fellow citizens," he said adding that the poorest were always hardest hit by any pick up in inflation.
"There is a large consensus (globally) ... that price stability is a necessary condition for sustained growth and job creation," he added. Trichet said central banks took decisions that were appropriate for their particular context when asked by the moderator of a panel discussion on why central banks around the world had different levels of interest rates.
He said the European public wanted the ECB to ensure price stability-which the independent central bank defines as keeping euro zone inflation close to but below 2 percent.
Euro zone consumer prices are rising at an annual rate of 4 percent, the fastest since the euro's launch. Trichet said he was sticking to comments he made on Thursday after the ECB rate decision, and repeated that the ECB did not pre-commit itself on the outlook for monetary policy.
"I have no new message. I repeat exactly what I said on Thursday," he told reporters on the sidelines of the conference. Turning to the financial market turbulence, Trichet said there had been a global accord on 67 recommendations made by the Financial Stability Forum, a group of international regulators, and that it was vital to implement these ideas.