WOLFSBURG, Germany — Volkswagen on Wednesday elected Chief Financial Officer Hans Dieter Poetsch to chair its board of directors, a move that came as the German automaker struggles to contain a scandal over emission-test rigging in the U.S.
Ahead of the announcement, VW's new CEO said the company planned to begin in January a recall of vehicles with the software at the center of the scandal and that it aims to fix them all by the end of next year.
Volkswagen has said up to 11 million vehicles worldwide across several of its brands contain the diesel engine with the software used to cheat on U.S. emissions tests. CEO Matthias Mueller told the daily newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung: "It will hopefully be fewer, but in any case still far too many."
Asked when the recall will begin, Mueller said in the interview published Wednesday that "care goes before speed" and that if everything goes "as planned, we can start the recall in January."
"All the cars should be in order by the end of 2016," he added.
Read Thursday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.