Libya's rebel government says it will not extradite the man convicted of the 1988 Lockerbie bombings, which killed 270 people.

The Transitional National Council's justice minister told reporters in Tripoli Sunday Abdel Baset al-Megrahi has already been tried and convicted in Scotland for bombing Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. He said the rebels will not hand over Libyan citizens as former leader Moammar Gadhafi did.

Scottish authorities freed al-Megrahi in 2009 on compassionate grounds. Doctors said he had cancer and only months to live. He had served eight years.

The decision to release al-Megrahi outraged the families of the Lockerbie bombing victims, many of whom were from the U.S. The fall of the Gadhafi regime has sparked hopes that Libya's new leaders would be willing to extradite al-Megrahi who is still alive and living in Libya.