WARSAW: Poland's central bank wants to buy at least 100 tonnes of gold -- worth some $5.5 billion at current prices -- over the coming years, as it continues to expand its bullion reserves, governor Adam Glapinski said in an interview published on Monday.

"At the moment, we have 229 tonnes of gold, of which more or less half was bought during my term in office," Glapinski told conservative magazine Sieci.

"Over the course of a few years we want to buy at least another 100 tonnes of gold and keep it in Poland as well," he said.

Over the last decade central banks, particularly in Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Asia, have stepped up purchases of gold, often seeing it as a way to reduce reliance on assets such as the US dollar.

Gold was trading around $1,730 an ounce on Monday.

In excerpts from the interview published on Sunday, Glapinski said the chances of a change in Polish interest rates are almost zero.