OpenVPN: 'Private key password verification failed' with verified config

I installed OpenVPN with:

$ sudo apt-get install openvpn

I then run the client with the config file I received from my company.

$ sudo openvpn --config myconfig.ovpn

The config has been verified working on a colleague's machine. But one exception: My colleague is using a Windows system, I'm using Debian.

Error

Fri Jul 27 11:33:34 2018 OpenVPN 2.4.0 x86_64-pc-linux-gnu [SSL (OpenSSL)] [LZO] [LZ4] [EPOLL] [PKCS11] [MH/PKTINFO] [AEAD] built on Jul 18 2017Fri Jul 27 11:33:34 2018 library versions: OpenSSL 1.0.2l  25 May 2017, LZO 2.08Fri Jul 27 11:33:34 2018 Error: private key password verification failedFri Jul 27 11:33:34 2018 Exiting due to fatal error

Prerequisites

• Debian Stretch LXDE (latest)
• No server environment installed
• No Pre-VPN environments installed

Contents of the config

clientdev tunproto udpremote example.com 1194resolv-retry infinitenobindpersist-keypersist-tunremote-cert-tls servertls-version-min 1.2verify-x509-name server_pZFAVxw3z2VPJhKI namecipher AES-256-CBCauth SHA256compress lz4verb 3<ca>-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----<<base64>>-----END CERTIFICATE-----</ca><cert>-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----<<base64>>-----END CERTIFICATE-----</cert><key>-----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY-----Proc-Type: 4,ENCRYPTEDDEK-Info: DES-EDE3-CBC,C6B57204A2ECC239<<base64>>-----END RSA PRIVATE KEY-----</key><tls-crypt>## 2048 bit OpenVPN static key#-----BEGIN OpenVPN Static key V1-----<<base64>>-----END OpenVPN Static key V1-----</tls-crypt>

The official OpenVPN manual recommends my way of trying to run it. So I'm out of knowledge what the problem could be and seeking for help.

What could be the reason for the error?