Nazi war criminal Erich Priebke was secretly buried in an anonymous grave in a cemetery inside the
walls of an Italian prison complex, an Italian newspaper reported on Thursday.

La Repubblica said the coffin of the man convicted of one of Italy’s worst wartime atrocities was taken from a military airport and buried on the grounds of the undisclosed prison late last month.

It said the grave was marked by a simple wooden cross with no name but merely a number so family members would be able to identify it.

He died aged 100 last month in Rome. The Catholic Church denied him a funeral mass. Germany and Argentina refused the body.

He was serving a life sentence, under house arrest, for his role in the murder of 335 civilians during World War Two.