In my view, the interest rate cut by the ECB in April 1999 already made it very clear that, in order to prevent deflationary risks, the ECB is not targeting a zero inflation rate. And I would like to add that the ECB has quite deliberately not centred the definition of price stability around zero.
Instead, the ECB’s definition of price stability was intended also to take due account of the problems that may arise from the measurement bias, from nominal wage rigidities and from the zero bound of nominal interest rates.