Prosecutors to summon former chief of Volkswagen Korea again

Prosecutors said Wednesday they will summon a former managing director of the local branch of Volkswagen for a second time later this week over the German carmaker‘s alleged irregularities that came to light following last year’s emissions scandal.

The Seoul Central District Prosecutors‘ Office said it will summon Park Dong-hoon on Friday for questioning over his alleged involvement in the cover-up of problems found in vehicles sold in the country. 

The 63-year-old was first summoned Tuesday as a material witness to gain background information but his status changed to that of a suspect following the questioning.

Park headed Volkswagen Korea as the managing director from 2005, when it was first established here, to 2013, before moving to Renault Samsung Motors Co., the local unit of Renault S.A. He has been heading the local branch of the French automaker as the first South Korean CEO since April.

Seoul Prosecutors suspect the German head office was aware of problems regarding the emissions of vehicles equipped with Euro 5

EA189 diesel engines, based on emails transacted between the local unit and headquarters from 2010 to 2011.

South Korea’s environment ministry had demanded the German carmaker and some other vehicle manufacturers provide improvement plans for their excessive emissions of nitrogen oxide in 2011.

Still, the German carmaker did not submit the relevant documents. Prosecutors said they secured emails exchanged between the headquarters and the local unit in regards to this matter.

Prosecutors said they will soon summon Johannes Thammer, the current chief of the automaker's South Korean unit. (Yonhap)