The April 9 ruling was made all the more poignant by it coming just one day after the conclusion of a £10 million inquest into the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, and her lover Dodi Fayed.

For 90 days, no expense was spared in investigating their deaths in a car accident in Paris on August 31, 1997. Some 270 witnesses, including 11 members of Britains secret service MI6, were called to give evidence specifically relating to the spurious allegations by billionaire Egyptian businessman Mohamed Al Fayed that Diana and his son were the victims of an establishment assassination plot, headed by Prince Phillip.

In contrast, the Law Lords rejection of the appeal by Beverley Clarke and Rose Gentle means that the mothers have exhausted all legal avenues within the UK to press their demand for a public inquiry into the Iraq war.

Trooper David Clarke from Staffordshire was killed by friendly fire in March 2003 west of Basra. Fusilier Gordon Gentle, from Glasgow, died 13 months later in a roadside bomb attack, also in Basra.

The mothers were challenging a 2006 ruling by the Court of Appeal that the government was not obliged to hold an inquiry under Article Two of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), protecting the right to life.

So important was the mothers challenge considered that their appeal was heard by a panel of nine Law Lords, instead of the usual five, headed by Lord Bingham, Britains senior law lord.

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