Switzerland Temporarily Halts Volkswagen Car Sales Over Emissions

The Swiss Federal Roads office's move could affect 180,000 not yet sold or registered cars in the Euro5 emission category.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) —Swiss authorities temporarily banned the sale of Volkswagen diesel-engine vehicles which could have devices capable of tricking emission tests, BBC news portal reported Saturday.

Earlier this week, the German carmaker admitted to cheating US emissions tests. The company said in a statement on Friday that around 5 million Volkswagen diesel-engine vehicles worldwide have been fitted with rigged software allowing them to downplay their true emissions results.

The Swiss Federal Roads office announced the ban on Friday, according to the news portal.

The move could affect 180,000 not yet sold or registered cars in the Euro5 emission category, the media reported.

Last week, the US Environmental Protection Agency filed a complaint against Volkswagen, accusing the company of having built in sophisticated cheating devices that allowed the passenger cars to pass strict US emissions tests.

Volkswagen’s diesel cars were found to be emitting up to 20 times more greenhouse gases than they reported, according to the company's internal evaluation.

A number of countries across the European Union, along with Canada, India and South Korea have launched investigations to determine whether Volkswagen vehicles in their country have been fitted with this particular software.

The carmaker has pledged to inform all global markets how many of its vehicles had been affected locally.