Criminal proceedings against Volkswagen Group’s diesel-emission scandal has been started in Luxembourg. Regulators had been cheated by car manufacturers. European Union country's infrastructure minister said it was lodging a complaint with prosecutors without naming any of the parties under suspicion. He said that due to a large probability that a defeat device was used, they decided to launch a lawsuit.
In documents handed out to reporters at a news conference, Luxembourg's infrastructure ministry described itself as a victim of criminal action that led it to certify cars, saying it would not have done so had the tests not been falsified. Luxembourg is among seven nations under scrutiny by Brussels regulators for failing to impose the kind of penalties Volkswagen has faced in the U.S. over its use of illegal "defeat device" software to mask toxic diesel emissions.
Volkswagen has already announced 18.2 billion euros ($19.6 billion) of provisions to cover the costs of the cheating scandal. It currently faces an estimated $23 billion in fines, penalties and legal settlements in the U.S. and Canada. However, its legal problems are not over yet. Fish distributor Deutsche See has said it is suing the company for misrepresenting a fleet of vehicles it leased as environmentally friendly, becoming the first major German customer to sue Europe's biggest carmaker over its diesel-test cheating.
