Insurance giant American International Group, which has received US$173 billion in federal bailout cash, will still give its senior employees tens of million of dollars in bonuses, The Washington Post report.

In a phone call on Wednesday, US Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner told AIG Chairman and chief executive Edward M. Liddy that the payments were unacceptable and needed to be renegotiated, according to the report.

The company has since agreed to change the terms of some of these payments.

But in a letter to Geithner, Liddy wrote that the bonuses could not be cancelled altogether because the firm would risk a lawsuit for breaching employment contracts, said the report.

Liddy also expressed concerns about whether changing the bonuses would lead to an exodus of talented employees who are needed to turn the company around, it added.

AIG has agreed to restructure the 9.6 million dollars in bonuses it would have paid to the firm's top 50 officers. AIG's top seven executives, including Liddy, have already agreed to forgo this payment altogether.

(Xinhua News Agency March 15, 2009)