LONDON (MNI) - UK inflation in March is expected to come in over 3%, but still below the level predicted by the Bank of England in its February Inflation Report.

FRANKFURT (MNI) - The European Central Bank on Monday called for bids on its seven-day main refinancing operation at a fixed rate of 1.00%.

Bids for today's operation are due by 07:30 GMT on Tuesday.

The new refis will settle on April 21 and will expire on April 28, 2010.

FRANKFURT (MNI) - European Central Bank Vice President Lucas Papademos will not appear before the European Parliament this evening as originally planned, the ECB announced Monday.

"Due to travel disruptions caused by the spread of volcanic ash from Iceland, Lucas Papademos, Vice-President of the European Central Bank (ECB), will not be able to present the European Central Bank's Annual Report 2009 to the European Parliament's Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, scheduled at 7 p.m. CET at the European Parliament," the ECB said in a written statement.

ATHENS (MNI) - Eurogroup President Jean-Claude Juncker, speaking over the weekend, offered assurances that there would not be conflicting aid plans for Greece offered by the International Monetary Fund and the Eurozone.

"There will be one joint Greece aid program with common conditions, led by the European Commission, the ECB and the IMF," Juncker told the Greek financial website "Euro2day" on the sidelines of the informal Ecofin meeting in Madrid.

"Under no circumstances will there be different terms imposed separately by the Eurozone and the IMF," Juncker said.

VALETTA, Malta (MNI) - The European Central Bank's official interest rates are "appropriate" and given moderate growth and well-anchored inflation expectations, there is no pressure to change them, ECB Governing Council member Michael Bonello said Monday.

However, "the ECB will always be alert to change the rates if need be," Bonello said.

PARIS (MNI) - Talks among Greek government officials, their EU counterparts, the ECB and the IMF, originally scheduled for today, have been postponed until Tuesday or Wednesday because of the disruption to air traffic caused by the cloud of ash from an erupting Icelandic volcano, the European Commission said Monday.

BEIJING (MNI) - The People's Bank of China announced that it will sell CNY40 billion in one-year paper on Tuesday as part of its regular biweekly open market operations.

The volume compares with the CNY45 billion in one-year notes sold last Tuesday at a yield of 1.9264%, which was unchanged from the previous result.

The central bank also sold CNY68 billion in three-month paper Thursday at a yield of 1.4088%, a result that was also unchanged over the previous auction.

FRANKFURT (MNI) - Market participants should rely less on rating agencies, and instead should increase their own direct monitoring of developments to gain an accurate measure of a counterparty's creditworthiness, the European Central Bank said Monday.

"In the recent crisis, rating agencies did not prove to be a satisfactory source of information upon which to assess and react to a potential default, e.g. with regard to the downgrading of a financial institution," the ECB said in a report on the lessons learned during the financial crisis.