"We have to make or even force platforms, search engines to follow our rules in Europe," Oettinger said an event organised by engineering association VDMA on the sidelines of the Hanover Trade Fair.

The U.S. search giant has been engaged in a five-year-old antitrust investigation with the European Union that has stalled multiple times and caused a political uproar.

Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal reported that Europe's competition regulator is preparing the groundwork to file charges against the U.S. search giant.

Oettinger declined to give more details saying the decision lay with European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager.

(Reporting by Tom Kaeckenhoff in Hanover; Writing by Caroline Copley, editing by David Evans)