Last weekend I cloned this physical disk for an unrelated purpose. Afterwards, I upgraded the new clone openSUSE 13.2 OS with the reported problem to Leap 42.1 which seems to have - serendipity - solved it. If someone is working on this bug, I can retain the original disk with the problem and remount it to test any solution. Else, as far as I am concerned, it can be closed. Thank you.