More than 1,500 owners of Volkswagen vehicles in South Korea are participating in a class-action lawsuit against the German auto giant, demanding the cancellation of their purchases and full refunds, industry sources said Wednesday.

According to the sources, a total of 1,536 customers of Volkswagen and its luxury brand Audi joined the collective lawsuit filed with a Seoul court against the German carmaker, its local units and dealerships as of Friday.

The number of people suing Volkswagen has been on the rise since it was revealed by U.S. authorities in September that the German carmaker used stealthy software to fabricate the results of emissions tests for some of its diesel models. The scandal has widened to include other gasoline models as well.

"We will push to file lawsuits for 400-500 plaintiffs every week going forward," a lawyer representing the customers said. "As of now, around 6,000 people have submitted the documents necessary to take legal action."

They are demanding their purchase contracts be canceled and compensation be paid for losses caused by the revelation of the emissions fabrication.

Recently, Volkswagen decided to compensate customers in North America by giving them around $1,000 worth of vouchers, free repair and other compensation. Audi is to unveil similar plans later this week, media reports showed.

No such compensation plans, however, have been announced in other regions including South Korea, causing criticism that they are not equally treating their customers.

The local units of Volkswagen and Audi said that they will not draw up compensation plans for customers here pending investigation by the environment ministry of the cars in question. The results of the probe are expected to be announced in mid-November.

"It depends totally on the results of the probe. It took about

50 days even in the U.S. after the results of its investigation came out," a Volkswagen Korea official said. "Without the results, we cannot unveil any detailed compensation plans."

Industry data showed that about 95,000 Volkswagen cars and 30,000 Audi vehicles could face a recall in connection with the emissions fabrication scandal. (Yonhap)