President of the European Central Bank Christine Lagarde looks on during the Eurogroup meeting at the EU headquarters in Luxembourg on June 16, 2022. (Photo: AFP)

The European Central bank will go "as far as necessary" to fight inflation that is set to remain "undesirably high" for "some time to come", its president said Tuesday.

Soaring inflation is "a great challenge", ECB President Christine Lagarde said in a speech at the bank's annual conference on monetary policy. "We will go as far as necessary to ensure that inflation stabilises at our two-percent target over the medium term."