The chief executive of Volkswagen said on Sunday that the German government should consider phasing out the subsidies that encourage Europeans to buy diesel cars, a startling change of position by the company largely responsible for diesel’s popularity in Europe.

“We should question the logic and purpose of diesel subsidies,” Matthias Müller, the chief executive of Volkswagen, said in an interview with the German newspaper Handelsblatt. “The money can be invested more sensibly to promote more environmentally friendly technologies.”

Mr. Müller is the first German auto boss to publicly suggest that the government should stop subsidizing diesel, a step that would certainly hasten the technology’s demise. Though cautiously formulated, his comments represented a major turnaround.

Diesel was practically sacred to German carmakers until recently, but sales have been plummeting since Volkswagen confessed in 2015 to widespread cheating on emissions tests, a scandal that drew attention to the health hazards of diesel exhaust.