By Hilary Burke and Karina Grazina

BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - Falkland Islanders mourned Margaret Thatcher on Monday, revering her as their liberator after a 1982 invasion by Argentine forces, but many Argentines bitterly recalled her role in defending the South Atlantic territory.

Flags flew at half-staff on the Falklands after news of Thatcher's death on Monday aged 87. The head of the local legislative assembly said it was a day of great sadness and another resident praised her as "our Winston Churchill."

In Buenos Aires, however, one resident named Jose Raschella, 48, said: "I hope God can forgive her because I can't."

Thatcher sent a task force to recapture the islands, known in Argentina as Las Malvinas, in an operation she considered one of the triumphs of her 1979-1990 rule.

Argentina still presses its sovereignty claim over the Falklands and in the past year has stepped up rhetoric against Britain despite a referendum last month in which the islanders overwhelmingly voted to stay British.

"There's absolutely no doubt that Mrs. Thatcher had a special feeling for the Islands, she led a very difficult recapture of the Islands ... and the Falklands were always in her heart," Mike Summers, chair of the Falklands' eight-member assembly, told Reuters by telephone from Port Stanley.

"She's a very much revered person in the Falklands for leading our return to freedom in 1982, and it will be a day of great sadness for Falkland Islanders."

Summers said a memorial service would be held but it was not yet clear when.

The barren and windy islands off the tip of Patagonia, at the southern end of South America, have a population of around 2,500.

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Falkland Islands mourn Thatcher, Argentines bitter over past