Belgrano sailors remembered

Hundreds of Argentine sailors who died when a British submarine torpedoed the warship General Belgrano are being remembered 25 years on.

The sinking of the Belgrano was the most controversial incident of the Falklands War and one which caused the single largest loss of life in the conflict with a death toll of 323.

The former US warship, which survived the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour in the Second World War, was carrying more than 1,000 Argentinian sailors when she was torpedoed by HMS Conqueror on May 2 1982.

Fierce arguments still surround the justification for the attack which happened outside the British-imposed exclusion zone around the islands that had been invaded by Argentina a month earlier.

The then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, whose War Cabinet authorised the sinking, insisted afterwards that the cruiser had been a threat to British ships and was in an area where Argentina had been warned ships could be vulnerable.

In Argentina, where other veterans of the Malvinas war complain of being forgotten, survivors of the Belgrano are still revered as national heroes.

And in Britain the sinking remains highly controversial with critics claiming the attack escalated the conflict and destroyed hopes of a negotiated settlement under a Peruvian peace plan.

Lady Thatcher and members of her government have repeatedly defended the decision.