The meeting of the supervisory board's steering committee was called after Chairman Ferdinand Piech sparked a power struggle by telling a magazine he had distanced himself from CEO Martin Winterkorn, who has run VW since 2007.

The six-member panel including Piech and works council chief Bernd Osterloh, which was also attended by CEO Winterkorn, ended after less than three hours at an unknown venue in Salzburg, Austria, a source familiar with the matter said.

(Reporting by Andreas Cremer; Editing by Victoria Bryan)