Volkswagen admits to cheating, to fire CEO
Volkswagen admitted to cheating US vehicles emissions tests and said 11 million of its cars could be affected worldwide
Frankfurt: Volkswagen will dismiss chief executive Martin Winterkorn, a German newspaper said on Tuesday, after the carmaker admitted to cheating US vehicles emissions tests and said 11 million of its cars could be affected worldwide.
The newspaper, citing unidentified sources on Volkswagen’s supervisory board, said Mr Winterkorn would be replaced by Matthias Mueller, the head of the carmaker’s Porsche sports car business.
A Volkswagen spokesman described the report as “ridiculous.” A spokesman for Por-sche said Mr Mueller was currently at a Volk-swagen board meeting at its headquarters in Wolfsburg. Shares in Europe’s biggest carmaker plun-ged almost 20 per cent on Monday after it admitted using software that deceived US regulators measuring toxic emissions in some of its diesel cars and also after company said it would set aside 6.5 billion euros in its third-quarter accounts to help cover the costs of the biggest scandal.
Volkswagen also warned that sum could rise, adding diesel cars with so-called Type EA 189 engines built into about 11 million Volkswagen models worldwide had shown a “noticeable deviation” in emission levels between testing and road use.