Prosecutors in Argentina are appealing a judge's refusal to try Jeremy Clarkson and his former Top Gear co-hosts over their number-plate swap during their controversial south American jaunt.

Argentinian Falklands War veterans confirmed last night they had been told in a private meeting the decision would be contested with a higher court.

Maria Cristina Barrionuevo last month ruled Clarkson deliberately entered Argentina with a Falklands-referenced number plate.

Former Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson may be forced to return to Argentina to be questioned in court after entering the country with the controversial number plate H982 FKL

She rubbished claims by the BBC and the presenter - fired in March after an unprovoked attack on a producer - that the use of the plate H982 FKL on Clarkson's infamous Porsche was an 'unfortunate coincidence'.

But she rejected demands to formally investigate the Top Gear team for changing the plate before angry locals forced them out of the country, concluding programme chiefs had acted to avert more conflict.

Osvaldo Hillard, spokesman for the Malvinas Veterans Centre in the southern city of Ushuaia, confirmed local prosecutor Daniel Curtale had promised them an appeal which in a worst-case scenario for Clarkson could lead to him being sentenced to three years in jail.

He said: 'We do not share Judge Barrionuevo's interpretation of events in the slightest.

'We believe the Top Gear people changed the number plates in the full knowledge that what they were doing was illegal.'

Claiming he was 'surprised' the judge ruled without calling on war veterans to testify, he added: 'They called other people in and not us who were the ones who saw the Porsche had another number plate on on the last day of filming and reported it to the police.

'I'm very respectful of the justice system but I think they should have acted differently.'

The appeal will be heard by judges in the nearby city of Rio Grande, where Clarkson's Porsche is thought to be in storage.

Clarkson and his pals are expected to be asked to return to southern Argentina for a court grilling.

The vehicle at the centre of the storm had the number plate HI VAE on it when Top Gear workers abandoned it by the side of the road last October before fleeing across the border to Chile to escape stone-throwing locals.

They had been filming for a Christmas special which went ahead despite the diplomatic furore that ensued.

Under Argentinian law, illegal number plate changes can entail a conviction for falsification and a prison sentence of up to three years.

Mr Curtale asked judge Barrionuevo to open a criminal investigation for alleged falsification last year after the Top Gear escape from Argentina.

The judge said in her recent ruling, referring to the Falklands as the Malvinas: 'It should be understood that it is not up to me to investigate or evaluate the decision - arrogant and disrepectful to say the least - by the Top Gear production team to enter the country with one or more Malvinas-referenced number plates.

The former Top Gear team (from left) Richard Hammond, Jeremy Clarkson and James May, are rumoured to be close to signing up to online service Netflix to create a new version of the motoring series

'Nor is it my job to gauge the reaction - anticipated - of citizens to such an offence.

'My responsibility is to analyse whether a crime has been committed under Argentinian law in relation to the removal from the Porsche of the original number plate H982 FKL and its replacement by another.'

Concluding Top Gear chiefs had not acted in 'bad faith' in changing the plates and their hand was forced by 'massive government and popular pressure', she added: 'It led them to remove the original number plate and replace it with another which in principle wouldn't have negative connotations with the aim of ending the main focus of conflict and avoiding violent reactions by locals which indeed ended up taking place.

'The change was not done in a surreptitious way, but with the knowledge and approval of the presenters who participated in meetings with the programme producers.' The BBC has consistently denied suggestions the Porsche was bought for its number plate, or the number plate was changed after it was purchased.

Clarkson, 55, and his former Top Gear co-hosts are rumoured to be close to signing up to online service Netflix to create a new version of the motoring series.