Recession laggards may not stop ECB rate hike - Paramo

CORDOBA, Spain Nov 13 (Reuters) - The European Central Bank could potentially raise euro zone interest rates even if one or two of the bloc's members were still in recession, Executive Board member Jose Manuel Gonzalez Paramo said on Friday.

Asked if rates could be raised in such a situation, Gonzalez Paramo told reporters: "It cannot be ruled out."

He also said that although the region's economy was likely to continue to improve in the fourth quarter, growth was expected to remain below potential next year.

The ECB is expected to keep euro zone interest rates at a record low of 1 percent well into 2010 but it has a number of crunch decisions to make next month. [POLL/ECB]

Many of the emergency measures it has put in place to combat the financial crisis, such as uncapped, fixed-rate lending expire in January, meaning it must either renew them, replace them or scrap them. (For factbox of ECB crisis measures click [ID:nLR138405])

(reporting by Jason Webb, writing by Marc Jones)