Lockerbie families told they cannot appeal Megrahi's conviction

This is the headline over a report just published on the STV News website. It reads as follows:]

Relatives of Lockerbie bombing victims have been told they cannot pursue an appeal on behalf of the man convicted of the atrocity.

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was found guilty of the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over the south of Scotland on December 21, 1988, in which 270 people were killed.

Some families believe his conviction was a miscarriage of justice and say it should be overturned.

The Justice for Megrahi Campaign appealed to the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) in June last year. [RB: The SCCRC application was not at the instance of the Justice for Megrahi campaign, but of a group of victims' relatives.]

The SCCRC asked the High Court for guidance on whether the families can take forward an appeal on Megrahi’s behalf and a hearing was held at the Appeal Court in Edinburgh on Friday.

Judges declined their petition, saying the families were not allowed to continue with the appeal.

Megrahi died in 2012 after abandoning his second appeal against his conviction.

He was released on compassionate ground in 2009 and went back to Libya.