The former Argentine dictator General Leopoldo Galtieri has died of heart failure.
He was 76 and had also been suffering from pancreatic cancer.
Galtieri was admitted on Saturday to the Central Military Hospital in Buenos Aires where his condition deteriorated.
He was the third of the four presidents of the 1976-1983 military junta during which time thousands of dissidents were killed.
Human rights groups say as many as 30,000 were killed or disappeared during the period known as Argentina's "dirty war".
Galtieri was appointed president in November 1981. Six months later, he ordered Argentine troops to invade the Falkland Islands in a bid to reclaim the British territory in the south Atlantic Ocean, which Argentina claims it inherited from the Spanish crown.
He lost his post after the Argentina was defeated in June 1982.
Galtieri was arrested last July after a judge ordered the arrest of 42 former military and state security officials for prosecution on human rights abuses.