Serbia

Serbia << SUR bee uh >> is a country on the Balkan Peninsula in southeastern Europe. Belgrade is the country’s capital and largest city.

Serbia is bordered by Hungary on the north, Romania and Bulgaria on the east, North Macedonia and Kosovo on the south, and Montenegro, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Croatia on the west. Serbia includes the province of Vojvodina << VOY vuh `DEE` nuh >>, in the northern part of the country.

The first united Serbian state was formed in the late 1100’s. The Ottoman Empire ruled the region for about 400 years, from the mid-1400’s to the late 1800’s. In 1918, Serbia became part of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. The kingdom was later renamed Yugoslavia, which means Land of the South Slavs.

In 1946, Yugoslavia became a Communist federal state made up of six republics, the largest of which was Serbia. In 1991 and 1992, four of the republics—Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina—declared their independence. Fighting broke out between Serbs and other ethnic groups in Croatia and in Bosnia- Herzegovina. A cease-fire ended most of the fighting in Croatia in January 1992, but some fighting continued. In April 1992, Serbia and Montenegro formed a new, smaller Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

In late 1995, the government of Croatia and the leaders of the Croatian Serbs agreed to end the war in Croatia. Also in late 1995, leaders of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, and Serbia signed a peace treaty. A number of countries then recognized the new Yugoslavia.

In 1998, fighting began between Serbian forces and ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. Serbian troops withdrew in 1999. In 2002, the leaders of Serbia, Montenegro, and Yugoslavia developed plans to craft a new constitution and to rename the country. In 2003, Yugoslavia officially became the country of Serbia and Montenegro.

In 2006, citizens of Montenegro voted in a referendum to separate from Serbia. Shortly after the referendum, Montenegro declared independence. Then Serbia declared its own independence. Serbia’s southern region of Kosovo declared its independence in 2008.

Government

A president serves as Serbia’s head of state. Voters elect the president to a five-year term. A one-house National Assembly is Serbia’s legislative body. Its 250 members are elected by the people to four-year terms. All citizens who are 18 years of age and older may vote. People aged 16 to 18 can vote if they have jobs. A prime minister, nominated by the president and elected by the Assembly, oversees the day-to-day operations of the government. The Supreme Court of Serbia is Serbia’s highest court. The National Assembly appoints judges for life.

People

Serbs make up about 85 percent of the population of what is sometimes called Serbia proper—the area excluding the province of Vojvodina. About 70 percent of the people of Vojvodina are Serbs, and about 10 percent are Hungarians. The province also includes large numbers of Croats, Montenegrins, Romanians, and Slovaks.

Most of the people of Serbia speak Serbian. The Serbian language traditionally uses a form of the Cyrillic alphabet, the system used in writing Russian and other Slavic languages. But the Roman alphabet is also used for modern Serbian.

About half the people of Serbia live in cities. The others live in rural areas. Many rural families live in brick, stone, or wooden houses with steep roofs. Typical suburban housing consists of high-rise apartment buildings made of concrete. Most city dwellers live in older brick houses or apartment buildings.

Serbian cooking reflects both central European and Turkish influences. Serbian cooks are known for grilled, highly seasoned meats and spicy salads. Cevapcici, which consists of grilled meatballs served with raw onions on bread, is a Serbian specialty. Ajvar is a relish made of roasted red peppers. A favorite snack in Serbia is burek, a pastry layered with cheese, meat, or jam. Typical Serbian beverages include thick, sweet Turkish coffee and plum brandy.

Serbians enjoy many sports, particularly soccer. Basketball is also popular, and almost every town or village in Serbia has its own basketball team.

The traditional religion of the Serbs is Serbian Orthodoxy. Some Serbs are members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Hungarians and Slovaks typically belong to such ethnic churches as the Hungarian Evangelical Lutheran Church or the Slovak Evangelical Christian Church.

Children in Serbia must complete at least 8 years of elementary school. However, most children attend school for 12 years. Serbia has universities in Belgrade, Kragujevac, Niš, and Novi Sad.

Most of the adults in the urban areas of Serbia are well-educated. However, in rural Serbia, some families have traditionally kept girls out of school to work in the home or on the farm. This practice has kept some rural women in domestic roles. Loading the player...
Serbian folk dance

Serbian folk music is played mainly on the accordion. The violin and the tamboura, an instrument resembling a lute, are also used to accompany folk dances in certain parts of Serbia. The best-known traditional dance among the Serbs is the kolo, which is performed in a circle. In the late 1900’s, a new, sometimes extreme, pride in Serbian culture began to sweep the republic. This movement has sparked an interest in Serbian writers of the 1900’s, such as Matija Beckovic, Milos Crnjanski, Dobrica Cosic, and Vuk Draskovic.

Land and climate

The Pannonian Plains lie in northern Serbia. The region is mostly flat, with some low hills. The rest of Serbia is hilly or mountainous.

A number of rivers flow through Serbia. They include the Danube, one of Europe’s longest waterways. The Danube enters Serbia from Hungary, forming part of the border between Serbia and Croatia. The river flows southeast across Serbia and then forms part of Serbia’s border with Romania. The Iron Gate Dam on the Danube stands at Iron Gate, a gorge at the border between Serbia and Romania. The power plant of the dam supplies electric power for the two countries.

The Morava River runs north through the hills of southern and central Serbia and then empties into the Danube. The Sava River flows eastward, emptying into the Danube at Belgrade.

The Pannonian Plains have cold winters with a freezing wind called a kosava. Summers are dry and hot, with temperatures often rising to about 100 °F (38 °C). In Belgrade, on the edge of the Pannonian Plains, the average January temperature is 32 °F (0 °C). The average July temperature is 73 °F (23 °C).

The rest of Serbia has bitterly cold winters with much snow. Heavy rains fall in early summer. Summers are warm in the mountain valleys but cool at higher elevations.

Economy

Agriculture employs about one-fifth of Serbia’s workforce. The country’s best farmland lies in Vojvodina and in Sumadija, an area south of Belgrade. Farmers grow corn, grapes, potatoes, raspberries, sugar beets, and wheat. They also raise beef and dairy cattle, chickens, and hogs.

Many Serbs are employed in manufacturing. Factories in Serbia produce automobiles, cement, chemicals, food products, and iron and steel. Serbia mines coal, copper, lead, and zinc.

Serbia imports more than it exports. The country imports machinery, petroleum products, and transportation equipment. Leading exports include copper products, food products, iron, machinery, and paper products. Serbia trades with Bosnia-Herzegovina, Germany, Italy, and Russia.

Most of Serbia’s roads are paved. Railroads link Belgrade with major cities and towns in Serbia and in neighboring countries. Belgrade has the country’s busiest international airport. Some radio and television stations are government-owned, and others are privately owned.

History

Early days.

During the A.D. 500’s and 600’s, various groups of Slavs, including the ancestors of the Serbs, settled in the Balkan Peninsula in the area of present-day Serbia. Each group had its own leader until the late 1100’s, when Stefan Nemanja, a warrior and chief, formed the first united Serbian state. During the 1300’s, Emperor Stefan Dusan led the country in successful wars against the Byzantine Empire. The Serbian empire began to break up after his death in 1355. The Ottoman Empire, based in what is now Turkey, defeated Serbia in the Battle of Kosovo Polje in 1389.

Ottoman rule.

The Ottoman Empire conquered Serbia in the mid-1400’s and ruled the region for more than 400 years, but the Serbs never lost their national pride. Djordge Petrovic, a Serbian peasant who was nicknamed Black George, led an uprising against the Ottomans in 1804. Another Serbian peasant leader, Milos Obrenovic, led a second revolt in 1815. The Serbs won some liberties in these struggles. Serbia regained independence only in 1878, following the Ottoman Empire’s defeat by Russia in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878. In the First Balkan War (1912-1913), Serbia and the other Balkan states gained control of almost all of the Ottoman Empire’s territory in Europe.

A new country.

In the early 1900’s, various economic and political conflicts developed between Serbia and Austria-Hungary. In June 1914, the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, was assassinated by Gavrilo Princip, a Serb from the province of Bosnia-Herzegovina in Austria-Hungary. The assassination touched off World War I, which began a month later when Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. After the war ended in 1918, Serbia led the way in forming the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. Peter I of Serbia became the king. Peter died in 1921, and his son became King Alexander I.

Problems soon developed. The Slovenes and Croats believed the Serbs had too much power. They demanded greater control over their local affairs. It also proved difficult to unite the kingdom’s many ethnic groups.

The country’s 1921 Constitution created a constitutional monarchy. But in 1929, King Alexander abolished the Constitution and began to rule as a dictator. He renamed the country Yugoslavia. He created new political divisions that ignored the ethnic groups’ historical borders. His actions worsened relations among the groups. He was assassinated in 1934 by a Macedonian from Bulgaria who was supported by Croatian revolutionaries.

Alexander’s 11-year-old son, King Peter II, was too young to rule. Alexander’s cousin, Prince Paul, ruled in the boy’s place. Under Paul, an agreement was made to establish an autonomous (self-governing) Croatia, but not all Serbs accepted the agreement.

World War II.

World War II began in 1939 as a struggle between the Axis powers, led by Germany and Italy, and the Allies, which included the United Kingdom and France. Yugoslavia was unprepared for war, so its government tried to stay on friendly terms with both sides. Under pressure from the Germans, the Yugoslav government joined the Axis on March 25, 1941. However, the Yugoslav army rebelled. The army overthrew Paul’s government, and 17-year-old Peter took the throne. On April 6, Germany invaded Yugoslavia. The Yugoslav army surrendered 11 days later. Peter and other government leaders fled to London and formed a government-in-exile.

German and other Axis troops occupied Yugoslavia. A resistance movement against the Axis occupation spread among the Yugoslav peoples. Some of them joined the Partisans, a group led by Josip Broz Tito and the Communist Party. Other Yugoslavs joined the Chetniks, a group headed by Draza Mihajlovic. The Partisans wanted to establish a Communist government. The Chetniks supported the government of King Peter. The two resistance groups fought each other, as well as the occupation forces.

Communist rule.

The Partisans quickly gained the support of the Yugoslav peoples. The Communists set up a temporary government in Jajce (now in Bosnia-Herzegovina) in November 1943. Aided by Allied troops, the Partisans freed Belgrade from occupation in 1944. The Communists then began to govern from the capital. By the time World War II ended in Europe in May 1945, Tito and the Communists firmly controlled Yugoslavia.

On Nov. 29, 1945, Yugoslavia became a republic called the Federal People’s Republic of Yugoslavia. The monarchy was abolished, and King Peter never returned to Yugoslavia. The 1946 Constitution officially organized Yugoslavia as a federal state—that is, a state where each of the republics largely controlled its own affairs. The six republics were Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia. Vojvodina and Kosovo became autonomous regions (later autonomous provinces) of Serbia.

Only one political party, the Communist Party, was permitted. The government took control of farms, factories, and other businesses. The Communists began working to develop Yugoslavia from an agricultural country into an industrial one. Opponents of the Communist government were either imprisoned or exiled.

Yugoslavia was a close Soviet ally, but Tito refused to let the Soviet Union control the country. In June 1948, the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin broke off relations with Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia then began to develop its own style of Communist government. Yugoslavia’s republics and provinces received more control over local matters. In 1955, two years after Stalin’s death, Soviet and Yugoslav leaders reopened relations. But Tito refused to take sides in the Cold War, a bitter political rivalry between the Communist nations and the Western democracies. Instead, he became a leading spokesman for uncommitted nations.

In 1971, a 23-member council called the Presidency was established to head the Yugoslav government. A new constitution in 1974 reduced the Presidency to 9 members. Tito remained the country’s top leader as head of the council until he died in May 1980. Then, a system of annual rotation of the top post took effect. Eight members of the Presidency, one from each republic and province, took turns serving one-year terms as head of the council. Until 1989, the leader of Yugoslavia’s Communist Party also held a seat on the Presidency but did not take a turn as its head.

Political changes and ethnic tensions.

The Yugoslav economy started to decline in the late 1970’s, and the country began to experience severe inflation and other economic problems. In the late 1980’s, Communism was losing its grip on power across Eastern Europe, and many people in Yugoslavia called for a multiparty political system. In January 1990, Yugoslavia’s Communist Party voted to end its monopoly on power in the country. Many new political parties formed. Each of Yugoslavia’s republics held multiparty elections in 1990. Non-Communist parties won a majority of seats in the parliaments of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, and Slovenia. In Serbia and Montenegro, the Communist parties, now known as Socialist parties, won majorities.

For many years, tension had existed between ethnic groups in Yugoslavia, especially between Serbs and Croats and between Serbs and ethnic Albanians. During the 1960’s, some of the Croats and Slovenes began to call for independence from Yugoslavia. These demands grew in the 1980’s. Croatia and Slovenia charged that the national government took away too much of their income. They also claimed that Serbia, which had the most influence in the national government, sought to control the other republics. Demands for independence also increased among ethnic Albanians in Kosovo during the 1980’s.

The breakup of Yugoslavia.

In 1989, Slobodan Milošević, a strong supporter of Serbian unity and the expansion of Serbian borders, became president of Serbia. Under him, Serbia stripped Kosovo and Vojvodina of autonomy (control over their own affairs) and, in 1990, dissolved the government of Kosovo.

In May 1991, Serbia blocked the election of a Croat who was scheduled to become head of the Presidency under the system of annual rotation. Partly as a result, Croatia and Slovenia declared their independence in late June. Fighting then broke out in Croatia between ethnic Serbs who claimed part of the republic and the Croat militia. In September 1991, Macedonia—later renamed North Macedonia—declared its independence. In January 1992, a cease-fire between the Serbian and Croatian forces ended most fighting. But Serbian forces still held some Croatian land.

In March 1992, a majority of Bosniaks (sometimes called Bosnian Muslims) and ethnic Croats in Bosnia-Herzegovina voted for independence from Yugoslavia in a referendum (direct vote). Ethnic Serbs boycotted the referendum. Fighting then broke out between Serbs who claimed part of the republic and Bosniaks and Croats. Serbs soon gained control of about two-thirds of the republic.

In April 1992, Serbia and Montenegro formed a new Yugoslavia. In late 1995, the Croatian government and the leaders of the Croatian Serbs made peace in Croatia. They agreed to a plan that would gradually reunite the land still held by Croatian Serbs with the rest of Croatia. Also in late 1995, representatives of Bosnia, Croatia, and Serbia signed a peace plan for Bosnia. The plan called for dividing Bosnia into two parts, one to be dominated by a Bosniak-Croat federation and the other by Bosnian Serbs.

Kosovo crisis.

In 1997, Milošević ended his second term as Serbia’s president. Yugoslavia’s parliament elected him president of Yugoslavia, but some members boycotted the vote.

In early 1998, Yugoslavia received international criticism after Serbian police attacked villages in the province of Kosovo, killing dozens of people and burning many homes. Milošević said the police attack was a crackdown on the rebel Kosovo Liberation Army, which demanded independence for the province. Fighting began between the Serbian and rebel forces. Serbian forces destroyed villages in the province and drove many of Kosovo’s Albanians from their homes.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) sponsored peace talks in early 1999, but Serbian delegates rejected the peace plan. In March, NATO began air strikes against military targets in Yugoslavia to force the government to accept the peace plan. But Serb attacks continued, and hundreds of thousands of people fled from Kosovo. In June, however, Serbian military commanders agreed to withdraw forces from Kosovo. NATO stopped the bombing after the withdrawal had begun and sent an international peacekeeping force to Kosovo. The United Nations (UN) sent officials to serve as a temporary regional government. The refugees returned to Kosovo, but tensions ran high between Serbs and Albanians in the province. Despite the presence of peacekeepers, the tension frequently erupted into violence.

The fall of Milošević.

As opposition to Milošević’s rule grew, the government seized or interfered with opposition newspapers and broadcasters, and protesters met stiff resistance from police forces. A series of assassinations and attempted assassinations targeted mainly foes of Milošević.

A presidential election was held in September 2000. Although some opposition groups boycotted the election, Vojislav Kostunica, leader of the Democratic Party of Serbia, won the majority of the votes. Milošević and his allies claimed that Kostunica had not won by a large enough majority and that a runoff election was necessary. Kostunica’s supporters claimed victory, and protesters demanding Milošević’s resignation filled the streets of many of Serbia’s major cities. Police forces were overwhelmed by the size of the protests, and Milošević was ousted from power. In October 2000, local elections were held in Kosovo for the first time since the end of the war. Many Serbs refused to participate in these and later elections because they believed the elections unfairly favored the Albanians. The UN continued to administer the region.

Independence.

In 2002, the leaders of Montenegro, Serbia, and Yugoslavia formed plans to create a new constitution for Yugoslavia and to rename the country Serbia and Montenegro. The plans sought to address the concerns of Montenegro’s independence movement, which demanded more self-rule for the republic. Early in 2003, the parliaments of the two republics and the national parliament of Yugoslavia approved the new constitution, and Yugoslavia officially became Serbia and Montenegro.

Many people in Montenegro continued to call for independence from Serbia. In 2006, Montenegro’s legislative assembly scheduled a referendum on independence to be held in May of that year. In the referendum, citizens of Montenegro voted to separate from Serbia. Montenegro declared independence shortly after the referendum. Serbia then declared its own independence.

Recent developments.

In 2007, Serbia’s National Assembly formed a coalition government, which included President Boris Tadić’s Democratic Party and Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica’s Democratic Party of Serbia. Serbia’s new government voted against a UN proposal that would have given Kosovo more self-governing authority and a path toward independence. Most of Kosovo’s Albanians approved of the UN plan, but Serbia, which considers Kosovo a historic part of the country, rejected any plan that would lead to an independent Kosovo.

Also in 2007, the UN’s International Court of Justice ruled that Serbia was not directly responsible for genocide during the Bosnian War (1992-1995). However, the court ruled that Serbia violated international law by failing to prevent the 1995 Srebrenica Massacre, when Bosnian Serb forces captured Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and killed thousands of Bosniaks.

Kosovo officially declared its independence on Feb. 17, 2008, but Serbia’s government refused to recognize an independent Kosovo. In March, Serbia’s government collapsed over disagreements concerning Kosovo’s independence and Serbia’s path toward joining the European Union (EU). Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica resigned after members of his coalition refused to stop pursuing entrance into the EU. President Boris Tadić dissolved the National Assembly and called for elections to be held in May. No party won a majority in the elections. In June, the Assembly approved a coalition government, naming Mirko Cvetkovic of the Democratic Party as prime minister.

In May 2012, Tomislav Nikolić of the right-wing Progressive Party edged out Tadić in the presidential election. Nikolić, a former deputy leader of the extremist Serbian Radical Party, became president in June. In July, Socialist Party leader Ivica Dačić was named Serbia’s prime minister. In 2014, the Progressive Party’s Aleksandar Vučić became prime minister. In April 2017, voters elected Vučić to become the nation’s next president. In late June, government minister Ana Brnabić became Serbia’s first woman and first openly gay prime minister.