Argentina

Argentina is a country in the far south of South America, stretching along the Andes between Chile and the South Atlantic Ocean. Bolivia and Paraguay lie to its north, with Brazil and Uruguay to the northeast.

Buenos Aires is the capital, an autonomous city alongside the 23 provinces, and Spanish serves as the de facto official language. The Inca Empire reached the northwest before Spanish settlers came in the 16th century; Pedro de Mendoza set up a first Buenos Aires in 1536. Spain formed the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata in 1776. In the May Revolution of 1810 a local junta took over the government, and on 9 July 1816 the Congress of Tucumán declared independence, the date kept as Independence Day. José de San Martín then marched an army over the Andes to help free Chile and Peru.

A liberal, federal constitution followed in 1853, and the name Argentine Republic was fixed in 1860. Between 1870 and 1910 large waves of settlers, chiefly Italians and Spaniards, arrived as wheat and frozen beef sales abroad multiplied. The country is a federal constitutional republic whose Congress has two chambers, with three senators for each province. It covers 2,780,085 km2 (1,073,397 sq mi), and Aconcagua in Mendoza province rises to 6,959 m (22,831 ft), the highest point of the Southern and Western Hemispheres. Argentina helped found the United Nations and Mercosur.

Farms on the pampas grow soybeans, maize, sunflower seed and wheat, while the northeast supplies yerba mate for the mate drink. Mendoza vineyards are known for Malbec, the Vaca Muerta field holds oil, and mines extract lithium and silver. Tango took shape on the Río de la Plata, and Astor Piazzolla gave it a new form after 1955. Jorge Luis Borges wrote stories read around the globe, and Bernardo Houssay, Luis Leloir and César Milstein won Nobel Prizes in 1947, 1970 and 1984. Asado is the national barbecue, and with Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi the national football team won the World Cup in 1978, 1986 and 2022.