UPDATE 1-Pfizer offers up to $250 mln to settle Zantac cancer lawsuits, FT reports

(Adds details from the report, background from paragraph 2 to 5)

May 16 (Reuters) - Pfizer will pay up to $250 million to settle more than 10,000 U.S. lawsuits over cancer risks associated with its discontinued heartburn drug Zantac, the Financial Times reported on Thursday.

The drugmaker was set to pay between $200 million and $250 million in the settlement, the newspaper reported, citing two people briefed on the deal.

The settlement was disclosed in a court filing in Delaware last week, and is aimed at reducing Pfizer's potential liability, the report added.

Pfizer did not immediately reply to Reuters' request for comment.

First approved in 1983, Zantac became the world's best selling-medicine in 1988 and was one of the first drugs to top $1 billion in annual sales.

However, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration asked drugmakers to pull Zantac and its generic versions off the market in 2020, after a cancer-causing substance called NDMA was found in samples of the drug. (Reporting by Utkarsh Shetti in Bengaluru; Editing by Nivedita Bhattacharjee and Varun H K)