July 25, 2006	Tuesday	Jumadi-ul-Sani 28, 1427

PARIS, July 24: Central bankers around the world are worried that high energy and raw materials prices might feed into overall inflation, the head of the French central bank Christian Noyer said on Monday.

He also signalled that the ECB was likely to increase its key rates soon, as is widely expected.

Noyer, who as governor of the French bank sits on the monetary policy committee of the European Central Bank, told the Le Figaro newspaper that the rising price of oil “is bad for the world economy”.

He said that globalisation had had a favourable effect on prices for industrial products.

He continued: “But all central banks in the world fear that the rise (in the price of) energy and of raw materials will end up by spreading into overall prices for goods and services”.—AFP