Family of Lockerbie bomber launch fresh appeal against his conviction five years after his death insisting they are ‘100% certain’ he was innocent

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Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted in 2001 of the 1988 atrocity which killed 270 people

The son of the Lockerbie bomber has said he is '100 per cent certain' his father was innocent as his family lodge a new bid to appeal against his conviction.

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted in 2001 of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, when a flight from Heathrow bound for America was blown up over Scotland killing 270 people.

Al-Megrahi was jailed for 27 years but died of prostate cancer aged 60 in 2012 after being released on compassionate grounds in 2009. 

Today, following his family's decision to appeal the conviction, relatives of victims - who have campaigned for decades for the truth behind their loved ones' deaths - joined lawyer Aamer Anwar to hand files to the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) in Glasgow. 

Previously, campaigners had applied for the right to appeal in a bid to clear Al-Megrahi of one of the 'worst miscarriages of justice in British legal history'.

But the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, a Scottish Government body, rejected the application last November. 

It said it could not proceed without the input from al-Megrahi's family - which has now been granted.

Ali Megrahi, 22, said: 'The launch of the application for an appeal on behalf of the Megrahi family is a milestone on the road to prove that the verdict against my father was unsafe. I trust that the Scottish authorities will correct this unjust verdict.' 

The son of the Lockerbie bomber (pictured) has said he is '100 per cent certain' his father was innocent as his family lodged a new bid to appeal against his conviction

Megrahi lost an appeal against his conviction in 2002, with the SCCRC recommending in 2007 that he should be granted a second appeal.

He dropped the second attempt to overturn his conviction in 2009, ahead of his return to Libya, but his widow Aisha and son Ali met Mr Anwar late last year to discuss a posthumous appeal.

The SCCRC will now decide whether there are grounds to refer the case to the appeal court.

Rescue personnel carrying a body away from the site of the crash in Lockerbie in 1988

A police officer walks by the nose of Pan Am flight 103 in a field near the town of Lockerbie

The Libyan intelligence officer was convicted for the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 above the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988, but suspicions have always lingered that he was a scapegoat used to cover up the involvement of other Middle Eastern countries.  

His son Ali said: 'The launch of the application for an appeal on behalf of the Megrahi family is a milestone on the road to prove that the verdict against my father was unsafe. I trust that the Scottish authorities will correct this unjust verdict.

'When my father returned to Libya, I spent most of my time next to him and had the opportunity to talk to him as much as possible before he passed away. 

'I am 100 per cent certain that he was innocent and not the so-called Lockerbie bomber.

'Thank-you to all those people who have made today possible.'

The Libyan intelligence officer was convicted for the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 above the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988, but suspicions have always lingered that he was a scapegoat used to cover up the involvement of other Middle Eastern countries

Jim Swire, who lost his daughter Flora, Rev John Mosey, whose daughter Helga was killed, and Geoff and Ann Mann, who lost her brother John, his wife and their two children, joined Mr Anwar at the SCCRC offices.

Dr Swire said: 'As the father of Flora, I still ache for her, what might have been, the grandchildren she would have had, the love she always gave us and the glowing medical career.

'It has always been and remains my intent to see those responsible for her death brought to justice.

'I feel encouraged and optimistic that this may mark the start of another step towards discovering the truth about our families, why they were murdered and in particular why their lives were not protected in all the circumstances.'

Convicted Lockerbie bomber Abdel Basset al-Megrahi speaks at his home in Tripoli in 2011

It is believed the new appeal bid is based on concerns over the evidence that convicted the Libyan, including that given by Maltese shopkeeper Tony Gauci, who died last year.

Mr Anwar said: 'The reputation of Scottish law has suffered both at home and internationally because of widespread doubts about the conviction of Mr al-Megrahi.

'It is in the interests of justice and restoring confidence in our criminal justice system that these doubts can be addressed.

'However the only place to determine whether a miscarriage of justice did occur is in the appeal court, where the evidence can be subjected to rigorous scrutiny.'

Gerard Sinclair, chief executive of the SCCRC, said: 'As it does in every case, the commission will now give careful consideration to this new application.

'In particular, we will immediately be looking to see that this fresh application fully addresses the matters which we identified as missing from the application in 2015 and in particular provides access to the original appeal papers from Mr Megrahi's solicitors.

'If the commission accepts the application for a full review, there are several important considerations which will affect the timescale within which we will be able to deal with this matter, including any new lines of inquiry and the fact that the membership of the board has completely changed since the original referral in 2007.'

In May 2015 former Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill - who announced to the world the Scottish Government would set al-Megrahi free - released a book lifting the lid on the reasons behind his decision to free him.

The retired politician claimed releasing al-Megrahi on 'compassionate grounds' was only one part of a complex jigsaw.

The book, The Lockerbie Bombing, alleges the decision was made partly to secure £13billion of oil deals for British firms in Libya.

LOCKERBIE BOMBING: THE PAN AM TERROR ATTACK WHICH KILLED 270

The Lockerbie bombing took place on December 21, 1988, when Pan Am Flight 103 was blown out of the sky.

The New York-bound Boeing 747, named Maid of the Seas, was passing five miles above the Scottish town when the explosion tore it apart.

When first reports of a crash came through, many assumed it was a low-flying military training flight which had come to harm.

Flight 103 went down three minutes after 7pm, about half an hour after take-off from Heathrow, as it passed over the town heading out to the west.

The flight was running slightly late and should already have been out over the Atlantic en route to New York.

Sept. 9, 2009L Libyan Abdelbaset al-Megrahi pictured below a portrait of Libyan Leader Moammar Gadhafi, at Tripoli Medical Center in Tripoli, Libya

The cockpit section fell to earth at Tundergarth, about five miles out of town, landing in a field in rolling countryside within yards of a country church and graveyard.

A fuselage section came down on streets in Rosebank, on the northern edge of the town.

Meanwhile, the fuel-laden wing section came down on the Sherwood area on the western edge of Lockerbie, adjoining the A74 road, now a motorway. As it came down it exploded in a fireball made worse by ruptured gas mains.

It was in this area, Sherwood Crescent, where 11 Lockerbie residents were killed. No trace was ever found of some of the victims, who were vaporised in the fireball.

Lockerbie's Town Hall and its ice-rink were pressed into service as temporary mortuaries and within 24 hours of the disaster, a total of 1,000 police had been drafted in, along with 500 military helpers.

In the initial stages, 40 ambulances and 115 personnel attended at Lockerbie. They stood down shortly afterwards due to the minimal number of casualties, with all those involved in the tragedy either dead or having suffered minor injuries.

The bodies and wreckage had come down in two main flight corridors, one of which included the Kielder forest in Northumbria, the most densely-wooded part of the UK.

At the height the plane had been flying, winds were more than 100 knots. Some of the lighter pieces of wreckage were found miles away.

On the night of the crash, police made an immediate policy decision to treat the disaster as a criminal investigation.

Public confirmation of what had been suspected from the outset came on December 28, when investigators announced that traces of high explosive had been found and the plane had been brought down by a bomb.

A later fatal accident inquiry was to determine that the bomb was in a Toshiba radio-cassette player in a Samsonite suitcase which 'probably' joined the flight at Frankfurt in Germany.

Of the 259 passengers and crew - 150 men and 109 women - killed, 188 were Americans and 33 were British. The others came from 19 other countries including France, Germany, India, Sweden, Australia and Japan.

The 11 people who were killed on the ground - four males and seven females - were all British.