ECB's Trichet says confident on Greek budget plan

IQALUIT, Canada Feb 6 (Reuters) - The European Central Bank is confident Greece will meet its goal of cutting its budget deficit to below 3 percent of the size of its economy by 2012, ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet said on Saturday.

Trichet said in a statement that euro area members of the G7 gave an update to the group on Greece's efforts to ensure fiscal sustainability and would closely monitor the implementation of Greece's stability program.

"Let me reiterate the position of the ECB: the governing council approves of the medium-term goal that has been fixed by the Greek government to get the public deficit to less than 3 percent of GDP in 2012," the statement said.

"We expect and we are confident that the Greek government will take all the decisions that will permit it to reach that goal that I reiterated." (Reporting by Jan Strupczewski; writing by Jeffrey Hodgson; editing by Peter Galloway)