DaimlerChrysler AG is in talks with U.S. authorities to settle allegations of foreign bribery spanning three continents, The Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.

Any pact with the Securities and Exchange Commission and Justice Department is expected to require the German-American auto maker to pay a financial penalty and install an independent monitor, who would be charged with watching over DaimlerChrysler's compliance and internal controls for a set period of time, the report quoted people familiar with the matter as saying .

The parties have tentatively agreed on the monitor, whose identity could not be immediately determined. It is unclear whether the authorities will file charges against current or former employees at this time, the report said.

A DaimlerChrysler spokesman declined to comment beyond what the company had already disclosed about the matter in SEC filings. In March, DaimlerChrysler, the world's fifth-largest automaker by unit sales, disclosed in a regulatory filing that it had dismissed or suspended several employees after an internal bribery probe found the company made "improper payments" in Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe.

An agreement would close a two-year investigation. The U.S. probes stem from a wrongful-dismissal lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Detroit in 2004 by a former Chrysler accountant, David Bazzetta, who alleged he was fired in part because he complained to superiors about dozens of secret bank accounts kept by the company's Mercedes unit.

According to court filings, Bazzetta also said a senior audit manager told company officials that foreign bribery had once been a "common practice" and that Mercedes managers in a few countries were resisting efforts to "wind down" the practice to comply with U.S. law. The wrongful-termination suit was settled under confidential terms last year.

In its filing with the SEC earlier this year, DaimlerChrysler said, "We have determined that improper payments were made in a number of jurisdictions, primarily in Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe." These payments, the filing said, "raise concerns" under U.S. and German laws that ban the paying of foreign bribes.

It added that, to prevent a recurrence, it had taken remedial action, including "the severance of employment and suspensions of several employees."

Source: Xinhua