Draghi sees 'dramatic' improvement since worst of eurozone crisis

European Central Bank Chief Mario Draghi said on Friday that improvements in the eurozone had been dramatic since overcoming the worst of the debt crisis. "The improvement since that time has been dramatic," Draghi told a seminar at the World Economic Forum, referring to the summer of 2012 when he calmed markets by saying the ECB would do everything necessary to keep the eurozone intact. Draghi's words at the time marked a turning point in the eurozone debt crisis, bringing a return of stability on the financial markets after nearly two years of crisis sparked by the near default by Greece. Draghi told his Davos audience that eurozone was "seeing the beginning of a recovery which is still weak, which is still fragile" and primarily driven by exports. "Even Greece has actually achieved very meaningful progress," he said though he cautioned that he did not "think the work is finished" with high unemployment still a worrying factor. Draghi said that in some peripheral countries "no significant reforms have been taken overall" which posed the risk for more trouble ahead. Draghi said that he believed there is little risk of deflation -- or falling prices -- in the 18 countries that share the euro, noting that price falls came mainly from the bloc's most fragile members in the periphery. Eurozone inflation slowed to just 0.8 percent in December from 0.9 percent in November, according to the latest data published by the Eurostat statistics agency. That is way below the European Central Bank's definition of price stability of inflation at just below 2 percent.