The memorial service for Nazi war criminal Erich Priebke will be held in Italy, his lawyer said Saturday after Argentina, where the former SS officer wished to be buried, refused to accept his body.
“The ceremony will be held Tuesday” in a church in Rome, said lawyer Paolo Giachini.
Priebke died Friday in Rome at age 100 after serving 15 years under house arrest for a World War II massacre at Italy’s Ardeatine Caves that killed 335 people, including 75 Jews.
Giachini had initially said Priebke would be buried near his wife in Argentina, where he fled after the war, but officials in Buenos Aires have refused to accept his remains.
The lawyer did not say whether Priebke would be buried in Italy after the memorial service. He was sentenced to life in prison in 1998, four years after being arrested in Argentina.