Germany, Italy and Switzerland are jointly conducting searches of the two car manufacturers. Investigators are looking for evidence of tampering with the engines.
The Fiat Chrysler Group has already been the subject of proceedings in the United States in 2019.
KEYSTONE
A dozen coordinated searches are being carried out Wednesday by the German, Italian and Swiss authorities, at car manufacturers Fiat and Iveco, as part of the investigation into the “Dieselgate”, announced the Frankfurt prosecution.
“Investigators from Germany, Italy and Switzerland are currently raiding ten industrial sites (…) to obtain evidence of a device for handling” diesel engines by these two companies, the German authorities indicated.
The investigation concerns two engines installed in “vehicles of the Alfa Romeo, Fiat and Jeep brands”, belonging to the Italian-American Fiat Chrysler, and Iveco, owned by the Italian CNH Industrial, they specified.
These searches are carried out in a “coordinated manner” in the German regions of Baden-Württemberg and Hesse (west), Piedmont (north of Italy), and the canton of Thurgau, in the north of Switzerland. Their “duration (…) is not predictable,” added the Frankfurt prosecution.
Pollution rate tampered with to appear lower
They are part of the vast investigation into the manipulation of diesel engines unveiled five years ago, which shook almost the entire German automotive industry, as well as international groups in the sector. These engine handling devices made it possible to make them appear less polluting during laboratory tests than on the road.
The scandal was exposed in September 2015, when the world’s largest manufacturer Volkswagen admitted to having rigged 11 million vehicles. Fiat Chrysler has already been at the heart of a procedure in the United States which ended in 2019 by amicable agreements.
The group, accused by the American authorities of having equipped more than 100,000 vehicles with rigging software, had agreed to pay up to $ 515 million (555 million francs) to various regulators, and 300 million dollars. dollars (323 million francs) in compensation to settle a concerted action by clients. The Dieselgate cost Volkswagen more than 32 billion francs, most of it in the United States.
(AFP/NXP)
–
