Overview
- Argentina’s lower house approved the reform early Thursday with a 137–111 vote and three abstentions, and it will take effect after publication in the official gazette.
- The law moves decisions on which glaciers and periglacial areas are protected from a national scientific inventory to provincial authorities, narrowing coverage to ice with specific hydrological functions.
- President Javier Milei’s government and mining groups say the change creates legal certainty to attract large copper, lithium and silver projects, and the Central Bank projects mining exports could triple by 2030.
- Following Wednesday’s marathon debate outside Congress, thousands demonstrated and police detained seven Greenpeace activists who unfurled a banner from a statue.
- Opposition lawmakers and environmental groups plan court challenges, citing hearings where only about 0.3% of more than 100,000 applicants were allowed to speak.