London  - Britain's competition watchdog, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), Thursday brought charges against four past and present British Airways (BA) executives over price-fixing on fuel surcharges.

The probe would be the first to threaten managers at a leading multinational company with jail, the Financial Times said Thursday. Conviction could lead to prison terms of up to five years.

The watchdog decided to charge the four men over a "conspiracy" between BA and rival Virgin Atlantic between 2004 and 2006 to fix the price of passenger fuel prices on transatlantic flights.

The case concerns Andrew Crawley, BA's current head of sales, and three previous top executives Martin George, Iain Burns and Alan Burnett.

BA, as a company, was fined a total of around 270 million pounds (540 million dollars) over the surcharge offences by the OFT and the US Department of Justice last year.

Virgin was granted immunity after bringing the matter to the attention of the OFT.

The OFT said the four men were charged with "having dishonestly agreed with others to make or implement arrangements" which directly or indirectly fixed the price for the supply in Britain of passenger air transport services by British Airways and Virgin Atlantic Airways.

They will appear at the City of London Magistrates' Court on September 24. (dpa)