Lagarde's first news conference as IMF chief

Below are highlights of International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde's first news conference since being tapped to run the IMF.

LAGARDE ON WHETHER ECB IS TOO CONCERNED ABOUT GREEK CONTAGION

I have very very clear recollections of the first days of September 2008 and the last day of September 2008. Some people at the beginning of the month thought, 'not a big deal, it's OK, it will teach those guys a lesson.' The end of the month was not quite on the same page.

It doesn't hurt to be, maybe, overly concerned, but to anticipate consequences of any of the measures being considered. I think we've been burned once, better be shy this time.

LAGARDE ON IMF CREDIBILITY

For the fund to be credible, its analysis, its work needs to be candid, needs to credible, needs to be even-handed. There is no one category of country that deserves a special treatment and another that will receive harsh treatment.

LAGARDE ON MANAGEMENT STYLE

My style is about opening up, reaching out, engaging people and working as a team. I can't do it alone, they can't do it alone, we have to pool the institution together and engage the staff.

LAGARDE ON LATEST DEVELOPMENTS IN DOMINIQUE STRAUSS-KAHN CASE AND WHETHER SHE PLANS TO QUICKLY GO SEE HIM IN NEW YORK

The most important thing for me is that the institution is proud of its achievement. It has reasons to be proud of achievements under the previous managing director's helm and I'm the first one to acknowledge the quality of the work and the reforms that have taken place. As to the rest, we shall leave it to the legal course that it shall take and I'm not going to comment further than that.

LAGARDE ON LESSONS FROM STRAUSS-KAHN CASE

You will allow me and you will appreciate why not to comment on the comparative study of the judicial versus the continental law system as we call it. Different systems, different backgrounds, different ways of reaching what is critical in my view, and I speak as a former lawyer, the truth. That is what eventually all legal systems aim at.

Now, what lessons to be drawn as far as the media are concerned? I think the presumption of innocence is something that is highly valued the world over. sometimes protected, sometimes respected, and I think it would be the honor of the media to actually respect that as well. More broadly, actually, this huge appetite that medias have in general for the new announcement, the new bit that you will be able to capture and make headlines with, sometimes blurs the overall judgment.

There are obvious examples that we can use. When a program has been designed, when an agreement has been reached, it's obvious that the results cannot be acknowledged and computed the following day. So the passing of time that I was referring to earlier on, which makes us look a bit older, which whitens our hair, is also something that is of use to better analyze a situation.

LAGARDE ON NEED FOR COURAGEOUS DECISIONS BY GREECE

I hope that the Greek political parties altogether can be rightly inspired by the courageous decisions made by the political parties in Ireland, the courageous decisions made by political parties in Portugal. There comes a time when individual interests, political rivalries should be set aside, when it's in the national interest of the country and that was clearly demonstrated both in the case of Ireland and Portugal.

LAGARDE ON PRESSING ISSUES

You have the immediate pressing issues that have to do with sovereign debt. It's broader than just the euro zone, there is a tendency to focus on the euro zone because it is a mixture of various components that make it more critical and more sensitive and more difficult to address -- euro sovereignty, yet lack of political sovereignty in one single capital. It's a very broad-based issue that needs to be looked at as a matter of urgency.

The second one is the issue of capital flows and the fact that as a result of sovereign debt issues and concerns and doubt and suspicion by investors, there is a massive flow of investment to areas of the world that are not prepared for it and are fearing the effects on their economy. So these two are of immediate concern and are pressing issues.

LAGARDE ON WORLD CHANGES

The world is going to continue to change. We have these tectonic plates that are moving at the moment. And that needs to be reflected in the composition of governance and employment at the Fund.

LAGARDE ON NEED FOR DIVERSITY AT IMF

We must complete the 2010 reforms, and governance and quotas must be adjusted to reflect the new architecture of the world. But that should also reflect in our employment policies, in our training policies, in the way in which we build teams, in the way in which we organize recruitment so that people are not clones of each other.

LAGARDE ON IMF PRIORITIES

We are facing a turnaround that is very uneven. On the one hand the issues of sovereign debt, and that concerns all advanced economies ranging from Japan to the United States but clearly with a focus on the euro zone and in particular in the country of Greece. On the other hand, when we look at the emerging markets, we have, in some corners, the risk of overheating and we have the risk of inflation as well.