Argentina has decided to rename its top flight football league after a warship sunk by the British Royal Navy during the Falklands conflict.

When the season begins on Friday the Primera Division will be known as the Crucero General Belgrano Primera Division, according to regional press sources.

The General Belgrano was controversially torpedoed, with the loss 323 men, by the submarine HMS Conqueror on 2 May 1982.

Margaret Thatcher's decision to sink the Argentinian ship provoked outrage in some quarters as it was outside the exclusion zone Britain had imposed around the island.

However the British government argued that the ship still posed a significant threat.

The move comes amid rising tensions between London and Buenos Aires over the sovereignty of the islands.

Britain has insisted that the deployments of an advanced warship and Prince William to the Falkland Islands were "entirely routine".

William has begun a six-week tour of duty on the islands as a RAF search and rescue pilot, a move Argentina has slammed as "provocative", branding him a "conqueror".

It has also been reported that the Royal Navy has dispatched a nuclear submarine to the region.

The current row exploded after Argentina and its South American neighbours decided to ban Falkland Island-flagged ships from docking at their ports.