Significance to Humanity

• The Antarctic Treaty establishes the first international space managed in the interest of all mankind where no acts or activities taking place while the present Treaty is in force shall constitute a basis for asserting, supporting or denying a claim to territorial sovereignty.
• The Antarctic Treaty established a firm foundation for the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to cooperate during the cold-war;
• The fourteen articles of the Antarctic Treaty provide an ongoing firm foundation to successfully maintain the region south of sixty degrees south latitude, nearly ten percent of the Earth, for peaceful purposes only;
• The Antarctic Treaty provides an ongoing firm foundation for States to continuously meet for the purpose of exchanging information, consulting together on matters of common interest pertaining to Antarctica, and formulating and considering, and recommending to their Governments, measures in furtherance of the principles and objectives of the Treaty;
• The Antarctic Treaty prohibits any measure of a military nature, despite the complete absence of indigenous human populations and extreme isolation of the continent surrounded by oceans at the bottom of the Earth;
• The Antarctic Treaty became the first nuclear arms agreement in our world by establishing that any nuclear explosions in Antarctica and the disposal there of radioactive waste material shall be prohibited;
• Common interests among the Antarctic Treaty parties in the preservation and conservation of living resources in Antarctica facilitated the development and ratification of the Convention on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources;
• The Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty was adopted as a comprehensive regime for the protection of the Antarctic environment and dependent and associated ecosystems… in the interest of mankind as a whole;
• The Antarctic Treaty now has signatories from 47 States that together represent nearly ninety percent of the human population;
• The scientific basis of international cooperation founded by the Antarctic Treaty offers humankind an institutional precedent for the peaceful governance of international spaces;