In Argentine dictator Videla's birthplace, townspeople gather to protest his burial
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}FILE - In this March 24, 1977 file photo, Gen. Jorge Rafael Videla is seen commemorating the first anniversary of the military coup in Asuncion, Argentina. The former Argentine dictator died of natural causes Friday, May 17, 2013, while serving life sentences at the Marcos Paz prison for crimes against humanity. Videla took power in a 1976 coup and led a military junta that killed thousands of his fellow citizens in a dirty war to eliminate "subversives." He was 87. (AP Photo/Eduardo Di Baia, File) (The Associated Press)
People who live in the hometown of former Argentine dictator Jorge Rafael Videla aren't happy about plans to bury him there.
Videla died Friday at age 87 while serving a life term for crimes against humanity during his leadership of a junta from 1976-1983.
The Videlas have two family crypts in the cemetery in Mercedes, west of Argentina's capital, where townspeople are determined to repudiate the junta that killed more than 13,000 people. They've put up banners outside the cemetery's gates and plan a protest in the plaza Wednesday.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The town's human rights secretary Marcelo Melo says they have no power to block the burial, and doing so would be to act like Videla's dictatorship, which left families without a place to mourn loved ones who disappeared without a trace.