A Swiss-based oilfield services company has agreed to pay $250 million to settle Foreign Corrupt Practices Act charges brought by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and other regulators.

The regulators alleged that Zug, Switzerland-based Weatherford International and its subsidiaries authorized bribes and improper travel and entertainment for foreign officials in the Middle East and Africa to win business, including kickbacks in Iraq to obtain United Nations Oil-for Food-contracts.

The SEC said Tuesday announcing the settlement that Weatherford and its subsidiaries falsified its books and records to conceal illicit payments as well as transactions with Cuba, Iran, Syria and Sudan that violated U.S. sanctions and export control laws.

The SEC charged that the company failed to establish an effective system of internal accounting controls to monitor risks of improper payments and prevent or detect misconduct.

Weatherford earned more than $59.3 million in profits from business obtained through improper payments, and more than $30 million in profits from its improper sales to sanctioned countries, the SEC said. The alleged misconduct occurred from at least 2002 to 2011.

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The settlement agreement settles the SEC's charges and parallel actions by the U.S. Department of Justice's fraud section, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Texas, the Department of Commerce's Bureau of Industry and Security, and the Department of Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control.

“The nonexistence of internal controls at Weatherford fostered an environment where employees across the globe engaged in bribery and failed to maintain accurate books and records,” said Andrew Ceresney, co-director of the SEC's Enforcement Division, in a statement. “They used code names like 'Dubai across the water' to conceal references to Iran in internal correspondence, placed key transaction documents in mislabeled binders, and created whatever bogus accounting and inventory records were necessary to hide illegal transactions.”

A company spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment.