Peugeot to keep German jobs if it buys Opel

French automaker PSA has pledged to keep Opel plants in Germany running if a planned merger goes forward, and to refrain from layoffs until at least 2019, a newspaper report said Sunday.

PSA, the parent company of France's Peugeot, Citroen and DS, has confirmed it is interested in taking over Opel, the German arm of US giant General Motors.

But the plans have sparked fears in Germany that Peugeot will cut jobs that overlap with existing positions in France.

German newspaper Bild am Sonntag reported that Olivier Bourges, who sits on PSA's executive committee, had assured high-level German officials at a meeting at Chancellor Angela Merkel's office on Thursday that existing contracts would be respected.

They stipulate that redundancies in Germany's Opel workforce would be ruled out until the end of 2018 and that investment pledges for four German factories would be kept until at least 2020.

The Bild am Sonntag report did not cite its sources.