A HAIRCUT of Greek debt is damaging to Greece and the euro area, and has stoked wider concern about possible impairment of bonds in other eurozone members, ECB Governing Council member, Athanasios Orphanides said yesterday in a newspaper interview.

ECB officials edged back from a threat to raise interest rates, saying markets have over-reacted to their change in tone on inflation.

CONSUMER prices fell more in Ireland last month than anywhere else in the EU.