The Province of Tierra del Fuego, Antarctica and the South Atlantic Islands or, more briefly,"Tierra del Fuego" is one of the 23 provinces that make up the Argentine Republic. In turn, it is one of the 24 self-governing states or jurisdictions of the first order that make up the country, and one of the 24 national legislative electoral districts Its capital is Ushuaia and its most populated city, Rio Grande.
The Patagonian region is located in the extreme south of Argentina, and occupies a large island, maritime and Antarctic territory, which extends from the Great Island of Tierra del Fuego to the South Pole, including the Island of the States, the Falkland Islands, the South Atlantic Islands, the Antarctic Peninsula, forming a triangle whose sides are the meridians 74°W and 25°W and its vertex the South Pole. In the American portion, the province limits to the north with the Province of Santa Cruz, to the west with Chile and to the south of the Beagle Channel, also with Chile. In Antarctica, the province also borders the west with Chile, although the boundaries are not established. With 1 002 445 km² it is the largest jurisdiction of the first order and with 160 720 inhabitants in 2010, the least populated.
With respect to the territories whose sovereignty is in dispute the provincialization law in its article 2 establishes that they correspond to the territory of the province, but "subject to the treaties with foreign powers that the federal Government celebrates, for whose ratification it will not be necessary to consult to the provincial government ", norm that authorizes the secession of said territories by the sole decision of the national State in the framework of the negotiations on sovereignty with other powers. It was organized as a national territory until April 26,1990, year in which it obtained the category of province through the sanction of National Law No.23 775 of the Argentine National Congress.