Our Antarctic correspondent brings us this report:
It’s cold here. It’s cold, wet, and my testicles have shrunk to the size of a sesame seed – but enough about the trials and tribulations of a reporter in Antarctica. Let’s talk about pizza.
Antarctica is just one huge slice of pizza that is about to come out of the roller-oven, and countries across the world are lining up with their pizza-cutters, ready to cut one delicious slice after another in a bid to control as much of the frozen circle down south as possible. The topping has already been digested, however, with Argentina, Australia, Britain, Chile, France, New Zealand and Norway taking “dibs on it” before Antarctica was set aside for peaceful purposes under a 1959 treaty. All that’s left is a last minute rush for the crust of Antarctica – the gooey, cheese-filled seabed possibly containing an abundance of resources, such as oil and gas. Strange ingredients for a pizza, and strange times ahead for the international community.
Head of the Antarctic Treaty Secretariat Johannes Huber claims: “Under the Antarctic Treaty you cannot increase your claim [and] you cannot make new claims”. This poses a problem for Australia and New Zealand, who are already licking the lips at the prospect of getting their very large mouths around a slice of Antarctic Pie. Indeed, they’ve already made slight indentations on the surface of the pizza with their cutters, both putting forward some low-key bids.
Antarctica
If countries aren’t aggressive in their claims, they may appear to be uninterested, and yet if they’re too aggressive, it could be seen as a violation of the Antarctic Treaty.
In an exclusive for The News Conduit, we contacted Head Pizza Maker in an exclusive pizzeria in Rome that cannot be named, and asked them about the situation. “Well, it’s the classic stalemate situation. If you seem too eager for the slice of pizza, you’ll alert others to this fact and increase your competition. Alternatively, if you play it cool and don’t seem too interested, you may lose the slice of pizza altogether.”
It is indeed, food for thought.
[via Reuters]
