Taking the world by surprise, on Friday 2 April 1982 Argentinian troops invaded what they call the Islas Malvinas (the Falkland Islands), in what the junta leader General Leopoldo Galtieri described as a “historic feat”.
Harold Briley, who has died of cancer aged 92, was the first to alert people in Britain and around the world to this shocking news. At that time the BBC World Service’s Latin America correspondent, he informed his radio audience from Rio de Janeiro that: “Argentina’s threatened invasion of the British colony, the Falkland Islands, is reported to be under way. A fleet headed by Argentina’s flagship, the Veinticinco de Mayo, was reported to be heading the invasion assault in which thousands of troops and aircraft were taking part.”
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