Anchor: A hearing was hosted by the Ministry of Environment on Monday to give Audi Volkswagen Korea a chance to clarify its position in the investigation into the carmaker's alleged doctoring of noise level, fuel efficiency and emissions results. After the hour-long hearing, the heads chiefs of the local unit of the German carmaker admitted there could have been errors made when drafting related reports for the vehicles in question. The hearing comes as the automaker faces being slapped with a sales ban and revocation of certification on its models and as the nation's trade watchdog is separately mulling filing criminal charges.
Our Mina Cha has more.

Report: The heads of Audi Volkswagen Korea pleaded for leniency at a government hearing in South Korea over suspicions of fabricating noise level and emissions test results.

After the closed-door hearing held at the National Institute of Environmental Research in Incheon, the company's managing director Johannes Thammer and vice president Jung Jae-kyun told reporters that they sufficiently explained their accounts of the accusations. 

The two officials said that they also pleaded for leniency, claiming there were no actual problems detected in emissions levels among the 79 vehicles in question but there were errors in authentication documents.

The German carmaker said last week that it will voluntarily halt the sales of the implicated models, whose sales applications to the South Korean Environment Ministry were found to have false information regarding noise and emission test results. 
 
Based on the results of the hearing, the government plans to make a final decision on a sales ban and revocation of certification of the models in question by this Friday.

The hearing came as revisions to the nation's air protection regulations will go into effect on Thursday, after which an automaker that acquired certification after breaking related standards can be slapped with a fine of up to ten billion won per model.

The carmaker, meanwhile, also faces possible criminal charges from South Korea's Fair Trade Commission, which claims the local unit exaggerated advertising to make it seem as if its cars met strict Euro 5 emissions standards.
Mina Cha, KBS World Radio News.