LONDON (AP) - British police charged a fourth man Monday in connection with alleged threats to assassinate Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

Lancashire Constabulary said in a statement that 24-year-old Muhammad Ali Mumtaz Ahmad was charged with possessing an item suspected of being useful for the preparation or instigation of an act of terrorism.

A police spokeswoman said the charges relate to the alleged threat to kill the prime minister. She spoke anonymously in line with force policy.

Media reports said the men were being held in connection with a Web site posting signed "al-Qaida in Britain" that threatened the life of Brown and his predecessor Tony Blair. The statement, posted on a radical Web site earlier this year, demanded the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, and the release of some Muslim inmates from Britain’s high-security Belmarsh prison.

Police arrested two of the men, Ishaq Kanmi and Abbas Iqbal, on Aug. 14 at Manchester Airport in northern England, reportedly as they were about to board a flight to Finland.

The men and Iqbal’s brother Ilya Iqbal - arrested in Accrington 35 miles (56 kilometers) north of the airport - were charged with terror offenses related to the same case last week.

The men were described by police as being Asian, which in a British context suggests they are of Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi descent.

Ahmad and the other charged men are from the northern English city of Blackburn.

Greater Manchester Police on Monday were granted a warrant for further detention to question a fifth man arrested on Aug. 26 in the central English town of Derby.

Ahmad will appear at Westminster Magistrates Court Tuesday. = Paraguay president alleges coup conspiracy

ASUNCION, Paraguay (AP) - Paraguay’s president warned Monday of a possible coup plot against his new government, saying that rival politicians summoned a key military figure to gauge support for their political ambitions.

Two alleged participants responded that the meeting never happened. But President Fernando Lugo said all Paraguayans need to be on alert for coup attempts by "antidemocratic and retrograde" elements.

"We will not allow attacks on the freedom of our people," Lugo told reporters summoned to his offices. "Those who intend to pursue conspiratorial projects will be met with all the tools the constitution gives me."

Lugo accused retired Gen. Lino Cesar Oviedo, a former political rival who placed third in April’s presidential election, of holding the meeting in his home on Sunday.

Lugo told reporters that a liaison between the military and Congress unwittingly was driven to the meeting. He was picked up by the chauffeur of Senate President Enrique Gonzalez, a member of Oviedo’s party.

The liaison was asked the political leanings of the military. He said the military is neutral and immediately left.

Oviedo said the military liaison did not visit his house on Sunday, while Gonzalez called Lugo’s accusations "absurd."

Electoral Justice Minister Juan Manuel Morales, also accused of attending the meeting, said he was working in his office Sunday night.

Oviedo, who once was jailed for coup-plotting and later cleared, recently helped Lugo form a governing coalition in Congress.

Meanwhile the leader of the country’s largest landless group and a lawmaker from the Tekojoja movement that backs Lugo called for public demonstrations in support of the president.

Sen. Martin Chiola of the Colorado Party, which ruled Paraguay for 61 consecutive years until Lugo took office, said protests are "unnecessary."

"These calls to the people could lead us to an inopportune and unpleasant confrontation," he said. "Nobody can logically consider a coup d’etat in Paraguay in these times of democracy."