Croatia ( ; ), officially
the Republic of Croatia (Croatian: Republika
Hrvatska ), is a country in central and southeastern Europe, at the crossroads
of the Pannonian Plain, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean Sea
. Its capital (and largest city) is Zagreb
.
Croatia
borders Slovenia
and Hungary
to the
north, Bosnia and
Herzegovina
to the southeast, and Serbia
and Montenegro
to the east.
The
Croats arrived in the early seventh
century in what is Croatia today. They organized the state into two
dukedoms. The first king, King
Tomislav was crowned in AD 925 and
Croatia was elevated into the status of a kingdom. The
Kingdom of Croatia retained
its sovereignty for almost two centuries, reaching its peak during
the rule of
Kings Peter Krešimir IV and
Demetrius Zvonimir.
Croatia
entered a union with Hungary in
1102. In 1526, the
Croatian
Parliament elected
Ferdinand from the
House of Habsburg to the Croatian throne.
In 1918,
Croatia declared independence from Austria–Hungary and co-founded the
Kingdom of
Yugoslavia
. After World War
II, Croatia became a founding member of the Second
Yugoslavia
. On 25 June 1991, Croatia declared
independence and became a sovereign
state.
Croatia is
a member of the United Nations, the
Council of Europe, the Organization
for Security and Co-operation in Europe, NATO
, the
World Trade Organization,
CEFTA, and is an elected
member of the UN
Security Council for the 2008–09 term. The country is a
candidate
for
European Union membership and is
a founding member of the
Union for the Mediterranean.
Croatia is
classified as an emerging and developing economy by the International
Monetary Fund
and a high income
economy by the World
Bank.
History
Early history
The area known as Croatia today was inhabited throughout the
prehistoric period.
Fossils of Neanderthals dating to the middle Paleolithic have been unearthed in the area of
Krapina
and Vindija. More recent (late
Mousterian) Neanderthal remains have been
discovered in Mujina pećina near the coast.
In the
early Neolithic period, the Starčevo, Vučedol
and Hvar cultures were
scattered around the region. The Iron Age left
traces of the Hallstatt culture
(early Illyrians) and the La Tène
culture
(Celts).
Much
later the region was settled by Liburnians and Illyrians, and Greek colonies were
established on the islands of Vis (by Dionysius I of Syracuse) and
Hvar
. In 9 AD the territory of today's Croatia
became part of the
Roman Empire.
Emperor
Diocletian built a massive palace in Split
where he retired from politics in AD 305.
During the 5th century the last Roman Emperor
Julius Nepos ruled his small empire from
Diocletian's Palace before he was killed in AD 480. The early
history of Croatia ends with the
Avar
invasion in the first half of the 7th century and the destruction
of almost all Roman towns. Roman survivors retreated to
strategically better defended points on the coast, islands and
mountains.
The modern city of Dubrovnik
was founded by those survivors.
Kingdom of Croatia
The Croats arrived in what is today Croatia probably in the early
7th century. They organized into two
dukedoms;
the duchy of Pannonia in the north and
the duchy of Littoral Croatia in
the south. Emperor
Constantine Porphyrogenitus
wrote that
Porga, duke of the
Dalmatian Croats, who had been invited into Dalmatia by
Byzantine Emperor
Heraclius, sent to Heraclius for
Christian teachers. According to Constantine, at
the request of Heraclius,
Pope John IV
(640-642) sent Christian teachers and
missionaries to the Croatian Provinces. These
missionaries converted Porga, and also a great many of the clan
that was under his immediate authority, to the Christian faith in
640. The
Christianization of the
Croats was mostly complete by the 9th century. Both duchies became
Frankish vassals in late 8th century, and
eventually became independent in the following century.
The first native Croatian ruler recognized by the
Pope was duke
Branimir, whom
Pope John VIII called
dux Croatorum
("duke of Croats") in 879. Duke
Tomislav of Littoral Croatia was one
of the most prominent members of the
House of Trpimirović. He united
the Croats of Dalmatia and Pannonia into a single Kingdom in 925.
Traditionally it's stated that Tomislav's
state extended from the Adriatic Sea to the Drava
river, and from the Raša
river
to the Drina
river
, but the precise borders are unknown. Under
his rule, Croatia became one of the most powerful kingdoms in
Medieval Europe. Tomislav defeated
the invasions of the
Arpads in battle and
forced them across the Drava. He also annexed a part of Pannonia.
This
included the area between the rivers Drava, Sava and Kupa, so his Duchy
bordered with Bulgaria
for a period of time. This was the first
time that the two Croatian Realms were united, and all Croats were
in one state. The union was later recognised by Byzantium, which
gave the royal crown to
Stjepan
Držislav and papal crown to king
Zvonimir. The medieval Croatian kingdom reached its
peak during the reign of Kings
Petar Krešimir IV
(1058–1074) and
Zvonimir (1075–1089).
Union with Hungary
Following the
extinction of the Croatian
ruling dynasty in 1091,
Ladislaus
I of Hungary, the brother of
Jelena
Lijepa, the last Croatian queen, became the king of Croatia.
Croatian nobility of the Littoral opposed this crowning, which led
to 10 years of war and the recognition of the Hungarian ruler
Coloman as the king of Croatia
and Hungary in the treaty of 1102 (often referred to as the
Pacta conventa).
In return, Coloman promised to maintain Croatia as a separate
kingdom, not to settle Croatia with Hungarians, to guarantee
Croatia's self-governance under a
Ban,
and to respect all the rights, laws and privileges of the Croatian
Kingdom. During this union, the Kingdom of Croatia never lost the
right to elect its own king, had the ruling dynasty become extinct.
In
1293 and
1403 Croatia chose its own king, but in
both cases the Kingdom of Hungary declared war and the union was
reestablished.
For the
next four centuries, the Kingdom of Croatia was ruled by the
Sabor
and Bans appointed by the Hungarian king.
The Kingdom of Croatia and Slavonia remained a legally distinct
constitutional entity, but the advent of a Hungarian king brought
about other consequences such as: the introduction of
feudalism and the rise of native noble families
such as the
Frankopans and the
Šubićs. The 1273
Congregatio Regni
tocius Sclavonie Generalis, the oldest surviving document
written by the Croatian parliament, dates from this period.
Subsequent kings sought to restore some of their previously lost
influence by granting certain privileges to towns.
The first
period of personal union between Croatia and Hungary ended in 1526
with the Battle of
Mohács
and the defeat of Hungarian forces by the Ottomans. After the death of
King Louis II, Croatian nobles
at the Cetingrad
assembly chose the Habsburgs as new rulers of the
Kingdom of Croatia, under the condition that they provide the
troops and finances required to protect Croatia against the Ottoman
Empire.
Republic of Ragusa
The city
of Dubrovnik/Ragusa was founded in 7th century after
Avar and Slavic raiders destroyed the Roman city of
Epidaurum. The surviving Roman
population escaped to a small island near the coast where they
founded a new settlement.
During the Fourth
Crusade the city fell under control of the Republic of
Venice
until the 1358 Zadar
treaty when Venice, defeated by the Hungarian kingdom, lost
control of Dalmatia and the Republic
of Ragusa became a tributary of that kingdom. Through
the next 450 years the Republic of Ragusa would be a tributary
Republic protected by
Ottomans and
Habsburgs until the
Napoleon abolished in
1808.
During this time the republic became rich through trade.
The republic became the most important publisher of
Croatian literature during the
Renaissance and
Baroque
periods.
Aside from poets and writers like Marin Držić and Ivan Gundulić, whose works were important
for Croat literature development, the most famous person from the
Republic of Dubrovnik was the scientist Ruđer Josip Bošković,
who was a member of the Royal Society
and the Russian Academy of Sciences
. The republic would survive until 1808 when
it was annexed by
Napoleon. Today the city
of Dubrovnik features on the
UNESCO
World Heritage Site list and is a famous tourist
destination.
Ottoman wars
150 px
Shortly
after the Battle of
Mohács, the Habsburgs
unsuccessfully sought to stabilise the borders between the Ottoman
Empire and the Kingdom of Croatia by creating a captaincy in
Bihać
.
However, in 1529, the
Ottoman army swept through
the area and captured
Buda and
besieged Vienna; an event which brought
violence and turmoil to the Croatian border areas (see
Ottoman wars in Europe). After the
failure of the first military operations, the Kingdom of Croatia
was split into civilian and military units in 1553. The latter
became
Croatian Krajina and
Slavonian Krajina and both
eventually became parts of the
Croatian Military Frontier which
was directly under the control of Vienna. Ottoman raids on Croatian
territory continued until the
Battle of
Sisak in 1593, after which the borders stabilised for some
time. The kingdom of that time became known as the
Reliquiae
reliquiarum olim inclyti Regni Croatiae ("The remains of the
remains of the once famous Kingdom of Croatia").
An important battle
during this time was the Battle of Szigetvár
(1566), when 2,300 soldiers under the leadership of
ban Nikola Šubić Zrinski held
back for two months 100,000 Ottoman soldiers led by Sultan Suleiman
the Magnificent, fighting to the last man. Cardinal Richelieu was reported to have
called the event "the battle that saved civilization."
During
the Great Turkish War (1667-1698),
Slavonia
was regained but hilly western Bosnia, which had
been a part of Croatia until the Ottoman conquest, remained outside
Croatian control and the current border, which resembles a crescent
or a horseshoe, is a remnant of this historical outcome.
The southern part of the 'horseshoe' was created by
the Venetian conquest following the Siege of Zara and was defined by the 17-18th
century wars with the Ottomans. The
de jure reason
for Venetian expansion was the decision of the king of Croatia,
Ladislas of Naples, to sell his
rights on
Dalmatia to Venice in 1409.
During more than two centuries of Ottoman wars, Croatia underwent
great demographic changes.
The Croats left the riverland areas of
Gacka
, Lika and Krbava
, Moslavina in Slavonia, and an area in present day north-western Bosnia to move towards Austria where they remained and the
present day Burgenland Croats are
direct descendants of these settlers. To replace the fleeing
Croats, the Habsburgs called on the Orthodox populations of Bosnia
and Serbia to provide military service in Croatian and Slavonian
Krajina. Serbian migration into this region, which had started in
the 16th century, peaked during the
Great Serb Migrations of 1690 and
1737-39. The rights and obligations of new populace of the Military
frontier were decided with the Statuta Valachorum in 1630.
National revival
National revival in Croatia started in 1813 when the bishop of
Zagreb
Maksimilijan Vrhovac
issued a plea for the collection of "national treasures".
At the
beginning of the 1830s, a group of young Croatian writers gathered
in Zagreb and
established the Illyrian movement
for national renewal and unity of all South Slavs within the
Habsburg Monarchy. The most important focus of the Illyrians
was the establishment of a standard language as a counter-weight to
Hungarian, and the promotion of
Croatian literature and official culture. Important members of this
movement were Count
Janko
Drašković, who initiated the movement by writing a pamphlet in
1832,
Ljudevit Gaj who received
permission from the royal government of Habsburg for printing the
first newspaper in the Croatian language,
Antun Mihanović, who wrote the lyrics
for the
Croatian national
anthem,
Vatroslav Lisinski,
composer of the first Croatian language opera, "Ljubav i zloba"
("Love and Malice", 1846), and many others.
Fearful first of Hungarian and then Habsburg pressure of
assimilation, the Kingdom of Croatia had always refused to change
the status of Latin as its official language until the middle of
the 19th century. Only on 2 May 1843 the Croatian language was
first spoken in parliament, finally gaining official status in 1847
due to the popularity of the Illyrian movement.
Even with
a large Slavic (Croatian) majority, Dalmatia retained large Italian communities in the
coast (in the cities and the islands, largest concentration in
Istria
).
According to the 1816 Austro-Hungarian census, 22% of the Dalmatian
population was Italian-speaking. Starting in the 19th century, most
Dalmatian Italians gradually
assimilated to the prevailing Croatian culture and language.
Austria–Hungary
100 px
The Croatian answer to the
Hungarian revolution of 1848
was a declaration of war. Austrian, Croatian and Russian forces
together defeated the Hungarian army in 1849 and the following 17
years were remembered in Croatia and Hungary for the policy of
Germanization.
The eventual failure
of this policy resulted in the Austro-Hungarian Compromise
of 1867 and the creation of a monarchic union between the crowns of the
Austrian
Empire
and the Kingdom of
Hungary. The treaty left unanswered the question of the
status of Croatia. The following year the Croatian and Hungarian
parliaments created a constitution for union of the
Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia and
the
Kingdom of Hungary.
After the
Ottoman Empire lost military control over Bosnia and
Herzegovina, Austria-Hungary abolished Croatian Krajina and Slavonian Krajina, restoring the
territories to Croatia in 1881. During the second half of
the 19th century pro-Hungarian political parties played Croats
against Serbs with the aim of controlling the parliament. This
policy failed in 1906 when a Croat-Serb coalition won the
elections. The newly created political situation remained unchanged
until the advent of World War I.
Kingdom of Yugoslavia
On 29
October 1918, the Croatian Sabor
(parliament) declared independence, creating the new State of
Slovenes, Croats and Serbs
. Pressured by the Italian army, which was
entering its territory from south and west, the National Council
(Narodno vijeće) started expedient negotiations with the Kingdom of
Serbia
and on November 23, 1918, a delegation was sent to
Belgrade with the aim of a proclamation of union. The
National Council delegation delivered 11 points which needed to be
fulfilled for the creation of a future state. The most important of
these points was the first, which referred to the need of a
constitution for the new state, a proposal that was passed with a
two thirds majority. Eventually, a constitution for a centralized
state was passed with a majority of 50% + 1 vote and caused the end
of state autonomy.
On 1 December 1918, the new Kingdom
of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes
, colloquially known as Kingdom of Yugoslavia, was
created. This decision created public outcry among Croats,
which started a political upheaval for the restoration of state
autonomy by the leadership of the
Croatian Peasant Party.
The unhealthy political situation in Yugoslavia became much worse
after
Stjepan Radić, the
president of CPP, was killed in the Yugoslav parliament building in
1928 by Serbian ultranationalist
Puniša Račić.
The ensuing chaotic period ended the next year when
King Alexander abolished the
Constitution, prorogued the Parliament and introduced a personal
dictatorship. The next four years of
the Yugoslav regime were described by
Albert Einstein in 1931 as a "horrible
brutality which is being practised upon the Croatian People".
During the dictatorship,
Vladko
Maček, leader of the Croatian Peasant Party, was imprisoned,
only becoming free after king Alexander was killed in a plot
organized by the
Internal
Macedonian Revolutionary Organization. Upon Maček's release,
the political situation was restored to that before the murder of
Stjepan Radić, continuing Croatian demands for autonomy. The
Croatian question was solved only on August 26, 1939 by the
Cvetković-Maček
Agreement, when Croatia received autonomy and an extension of
its borders and Maček became Yugoslav vice-prime minister. The
ensuing peace was terminated by the
German invasion of 1941.
World War II
The
German invasion of 6
April 1941 achieved victory over the
Royal Yugoslav Army in little more than
ten days, ending with the unconditional surrender of the Royal
Yugoslav Army on April 17.
The territory of Croatia, Bosnia and
Herzegovina and the region of Syrmia
became a
puppet state of Nazi Germany called the
Independent
State of Croatia
. Istria, the port
city of Rijeka
, and a
portion of Dalmatia up to Split were
occupied by Italy. Baranja and Medjumurje were occupied by
Hungary. Although the recently returned exiled
Ustashe was in charge of the new regime, the
Axis occupiers initially offered the state leadership to
Vladko Maček, the leader of the Croatian
Peasants' Party (HSS), but he refused. Only one day after entering
Zagreb, on April 17, 1941, Ante Pavelić proclaimed that all people
who offended, or tried to offend against the Croatian nation were
guilty of treason — a crime punishable by death.
The Ustashe regime
introduced anti-Semitic Nuremberg-style laws, and also conducted
massacres of mostly Serbs
and other non-Croats, as well as running concentration camps
such as the one at Jasenovac
and Stara Gradiska where opponents of the Ustashe
regime and other 'undesirables' were held. Catholic priests
who were involved in the Ustashe movement, particularly the
notorious Father
Miroslav
Filipović were defrocked. However, others such as the
Archbishop of Zagreb
Alojzije
Stepinac not only condemned Ustashe crimes in his sermons but
also offered refuge and protection to persecuted Serbs and Jews.
The Jewish Virtual Library estimates that between and
Croatian Serbs were killed at Jasenovac and
that between and Serbs were victims of the entire genocide
campaign.
The remnants of the Royal Yugoslav Army, later reorganized into the
predominantly Serbian Chetniks, offered resistance to the Nazi
occupation and their Ustashe collaborators, but the Yugoslav
Royalist Chetniks soon started collaborating with Nazis and Fascist
Italy.
Civil war broke out. Later, in
response to Hitler's surprise "Operation Barbarossa" attack on the
Soviet Union, a massive uprising began on June 22, 1941 with the
creation of
1st Sisak
Partisan Detachment. The leadership of the Yugoslav partisan
movement was in the hands of Croat
Josip
Broz Tito, whose policy of
brotherhood and unity would in the end
defeat not only the Axis occupiers, but also their various
collaborators in the armed forces of the Independent State of
Croatia and other quislings (which could be found in every Yugoslav
social and national group). The victory of Tito's partisans against
the Nazi occupiers and their allies resulted in the
massacres of those Croatian Domobran (Home
Guard) and Ustashe who were repatriated from Austria by the British
8th Army. In the decade after World War II, up to 350,000 ethnic
Italians left Yugoslavia.
The number of
World War II
victims in Yugoslavia remains a source of much controversy
amongst Serb and Croat nationalist academics and historians on the
one side, and independent researchers, mostly notably
Vladimir Žerjavić (a Croat) and
Bogoljub Kočović (a
Serb), on the other.
Socialist Yugoslavia
Modern
Croatia was founded on AVNOJ anti-fascist
partisans' principles during the
second world war, and it became a constitutional federal
republic of the Socialist Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia. A Communist dictatorship was established
but, because of the
Tito-Stalin
split, economic and personal freedom were better than in the
Eastern Bloc. From the 1950s, the
Socialist Republic of
Croatia enjoyed an autonomy under the rule of the local
Communist elite, but in 1967 group of influential Croatian poets
and linguists published a
Declaration on the Status and Name of the Croatian Standard
Language. After 1968 the patriotic goals of that document
morphed into a generic Croatian movement for more rights for
Croatia, greater civil rights and demands for the decentralization
of the economy. In the end the Yugoslav leadership interpreted the
Croatian Spring as a restoration of
Croatian
nationalism, dismissed the
movement as
chauvinistic and arrested
most important leaders. In 1974, a new Yugoslav federal
constitution was ratified that gave more autonomy to the individual
republics, thereby basically fulfilling the main goals of the
Croatian Spring.
Independent Croatia
Nationalistic sentiment, which would bring an end to the Yugoslav
federation, had been widespread among various ethnicities for some
years.
Albanian demands in 1981 for Kosovo
to be removed from Serbia and transformed to a
constituent republic within Yugoslavia led to riots, and similar
attitudes surfaced among other nations with the Serbian SANU
Memorandum in 1986; Croatia and Slovenia also responded
negatively in 1989 after Serbia's leader Slobodan Milošević
organized coups in Vojvodina
, Kosovo and Montenegro to install authorities who would be loyal to his
cause.
Under the influence of
Slobodan Milošević's
propaganda, the importance of who won the first Croatian
multi-party elections in 50 years was diminished. Allegedly, Serbs
had influenced both Croatian nationalist leader
Franjo Tuđman and communist leader
Ivica Račan. The electoral win of
Franjo Tuđman further inflamed the situation.
Croatian Serbs left
the Croatian parliament and created the Association of the
Municipalities of Northern Dalmatia and Lika in
Knin
. This was later to become the
Republika Srpska Krajina. On the
events of 1990-92,
Milan Babić,
president of Republika Srpska Krajina, was later to declare that he
had been "strongly influenced and misled by Serbian propaganda".
These events culminated in the full scale Croatian War of
Independence between 1991 and 1995. The conflict ended with
Operation Storm (known in Croatian
as
Oluja) in the summer of 1995.
The
events of August 1995 remain the subject of several cases before
the International Criminal Tribunal for the
former Yugoslavia
, regarding the conduct of the victorious Croatian Army and the exodus of ethnic
Serbs.
Croatia was internationally recognized on 15 January 1992 by the
European Union and the
United Nations. During that time, Croatia
controlled less than two thirds of its legal territory.
The first
country to recognize Croatia was Iceland
on 19 December 1991.
Geography
An old map of Croatia
Croatia is located between
South-Central
Europe and
Middle Europe.
Its shape
resembles that of a crescent or a horseshoe, which flanks its
neighbours Serbia, Bosnia and
Herzegovina and Montenegro. To the north lie Slovenia and Hungary; Italy lies
across the Adriatic
Sea
. Its mainland territory is split in two
non-contiguous parts by the short coastline of Bosnia and
Herzegovina around Neum
.
Its terrain is diverse, including:
Phytogeographically, Croatia belongs
to the
Boreal Kingdom and is shared
between the Central European and Illyrian provinces of the
Circumboreal Region and the Adriatic
province of the
Mediterranean
Region. According to the
WWF, the territory of Croatia can
be subdivided into three
ecoregions: the
Pannonian mixed forests,
Dinaric Mountains mixed
forests and
Illyrian
deciduous forests.
The country is famous for its many
national parks.Croatia has
a mixture of
climates. In the north and east
it is
continental,
Mediterranean along the coast and a
semi-highland and
highland climate
in the south-central region.
Istra has a temperate climate, while the Palagruža
archipelago is home to a subtropical climate.
Insular Croatia consists of over one thousand islands varying in
size.
The
largest islands in Croatia are Cres
and
Krk
which are located in the Adriatic Sea.
The
Danube, Europe's second longest river, runs
through the city of Vukovar
. Dinara
, the eponym
of the Dinaric Alps, is the highest
peak of Croatia at 1,831 metres above sea level.
There are 49
caves deeper than 250 m in
Croatia, 14 of them are deeper than 500 m and three deeper than
1000 m (the Lukina jama-Trojama, Slovacka jama and Velebita cave
systems). The deepest Croatian pits are mostly found in two regions
- Mt. Velebit and Mt. Biokovo.
Counties
Croatia is divided into 20 counties (
županija) and the
capital city of Zagreb:
World Heritage Sites
Government and politics
Since the adoption of the 1990
Constitution, Croatia has been a
democracy. Between 1990 and 2000 it had a
semi-presidential system,
and since 2000 it has a
parliamentary system.
The
President of the Republic
(
Predsjednik) is the
head of
state, directly elected to a five-year term and is limited by
the Constitution to a maximum of two terms. In addition to being
the
commander in chief of the
armed forces, the president has the procedural duty of appointing
the Prime minister with the consent of the Parliament, and has some
influence on foreign policy.
His official
residence is Predsjednički dvori
. Apart from that he has summer residences on
the islands of Vanga (Brijuni
islands) and the island of Hvar.
The
Croatian
Parliament
(Sabor) is a unicameral legislative body (a second chamber,
the "House of Counties", which was set up by the Constitution of
1990, was abolished in 2001). The number of the Sabor's
members can vary from 100 to 160; they are all elected by popular
vote to serve four-year terms. The plenary sessions of the Sabor
take place from January 15 to July 15, and from September 15 to
December 15.
The
Croatian Government
(
Vlada) is headed by the
Prime minister who has two deputy
prime ministers and fourteen ministers in charge of particular
sectors of activity. The
executive branch is responsible for
proposing legislation and a budget, executing the laws, and guiding
the foreign and internal policies of the republic.
Government's official residence is at Banski dvori
.
Law
Croatia
has a three-tiered judicial system, consisting of the Supreme
Court
, County courts, and
Municipal courts. The
Constitutional Court rules on
matters regarding the
Constitution. Law enforcement in
Croatia is the responsibility of the Croatian police force, which
is under the control of the
Ministry of the Interior.
In recent years, the force has been undergoing a reform with
assistance from international agencies, including the
Organization
for Security and Co-operation in Europe since its mission to
Croatia began on 18 April 1996.
Demographics
Croatia is inhabited mostly by
Croats
(89.6%), while minority groups include
Serbs
(4.5%),
Bosniaks,
Hungarians,
Italians,
Slovenes,
Germans,
Czechs,
Romani
people and others (5.9%). For most of the 20th century, the
population of Croatia has been rising from 3,430,270 in 1931 to
4,784,265 in 1991. The natural growth rate of the population is
currently negative with the
demographic transition completed in
the 1970s. Average
life expectancy
is 75.1 years, and the literacy rate is 98.1 percent. During recent
years, Croatian government is pressured each year to add 40% to
work permit quotas for foreign workers and in accordance with its
immigration policy it is trying to entice emigrants to return
[526]. The main religions of Croatia are Roman
Catholic 88%, Orthodox 4.4%, other Christian 0.4%, Muslim 1.3%,
other and unspecified 0.9%, none 5.2%.
During the last decade of the 20th century the population of
Croatia has been stagnating because of
Croatian War of Independence.
During the war, large sections of the population were displaced and
emigration increased. In 1991, in predominantly Serb areas, more
than 80,000 Croats were either removed out of their homes by the
Croatian Serb forces or fled the violence. During the final days of
the war in 1995, more than 120,000 Serbs, and perhaps as many as
200,000 fled before the victory by Croatian forces. Only a small
fraction of Serbs have returned to their homes since 1995,
according to the
Human Rights
Watch. Croatia's remaining Serbs do not live in the highlands
and inland of Dalmatia but in the Croatian heartland and major
cities. Serbs have been re-settled by the Croatian Government in
the regions they previously inhabited.
Economy
Privatization and the drive toward a
market economy had barely begun under
the new Croatian Government when war broke out in 1991. As a result
of the war, the economic infrastructure sustained massive damage,
particularly the revenue-rich tourism industry. From 1989 to 1993,
GDP fell 40.5%. With the end of the war in 1995, tourism and
Croatia's economy recovered moderately. However,
corruption,
cronyism, and a general lack of
transparency stymied meaningful
economic reform, as well as much-needed
foreign investment.
Croatia's economy turned the corner in 2000 as tourism rebounded.
The economy expanded in 2002, stimulated by a credit boom led by
newly privatized and foreign-capitalized banks, some capital
investment, most importantly road construction, further growth in
tourism, and gains by small and medium-sized private
enterprises.
Croatia has a
high-income market
economy.
International Monetary Fund data shows that Croatian nominal GDP stood at $58.585 billion, or $13,205
per capita, in 2007. The IMF forecast for 2008 is $69.357
billion, or $15,633 per capita. In
purchasing power parity terms, total
GDP was $78.824 billion in 2007, equivalent to $17,767 per capita.
For 2008, it is forecast to be $82.407 billion, or $18,575 per
capita.
According to
Eurostat data, Croatian PPS
GDP per capita stood at 63 per cent of the EU average in 2008. Real
GDP growth in 2007 was 6.0 per cent. The average gross salary of a
Croat during the first nine months of 2008 was 7,161 kuna (
US$ 1,530) per month In 2007, the
International Labour
Organization-defined
unemployment
rate stood at 9.1 per cent, after falling steadily from 14.7
percent in 2002. The registered unemployment rate is higher,
though, standing at 13.7 percent in December 2008.
In 2007, 7.2 percent of economic output was accounted for by
agriculture, 32.8 percent by
industry and 60.7 percent by the
service sector. According to 2004 data, 2.7
percent of the workforce were employed in agriculture, 32.8 percent
by industry and 64.5 in services.
The industrial sector is dominated by shipbuilding, food processing
and the chemical industry.
Tourism is a
notable source of income during the summer, with over 11 million
foreign tourists in 2008 generating a revenue of €8 billion.
Croatia is ranked as the 18th most popular tourist destination in
the world. In 2006 Croatia exported goods to the value of $10.4
billion (
FOB) ($19.7 billion including
service exports).
The Croatian state still controls a significant part of the
economy, with government spending accounting for as much as 40% of
GDP. Some large, state-owned industries, such as the country's
shipyards, continue to rely on government subsidies, crowding out
investment in education and technology needed to ensure the
economy's long-term competitiveness.
Of particular concern is the backlogged
judiciary system, combined with inefficient
public administration,
especially issues of land ownership and corruption. Another main
problem includes the large and growing national debt which has
reached over 34 billion euro or 89.1 per cent of the nations gross
domestic product. Because of these problems, studies show that the
population of Croatia generally has negative expectations of the
country's economic future.
Croatia has so far weathered the global financial crisis reasonably
well, but faces significant challenges in 2009 largely due to an
expected downturn in Croatia's top export commodity, tourism.
Croatia's external imbalances and high
foreign debt present risks as well, as
continued access to foreign credit in 2009 may be severely
limited.
The country has been preparing for membership in the
European Union, its most important
trading partner. In February 2005, the
Stabilisation and
Association Agreement with the
EU
officially came into force.
Infrastructure
The
highlight of Croatia's recent infrastructure developments is its rapidly
growing highway network, of which plans were drawn and work
commenced in the 1970s, but was realised only after independence
because of the (then) Yugoslav
Government
plans of road projects of 'national'
importance.
Croatia has now over 1,200 km of highways connecting Zagreb to
most other regions.
The best known highways are A1, connecting Zagreb to Split and A3, passing
east-west through northwest Croatia and Slavonia. Most highways are tolled, except the
Zagreb
bypass
and sections of A3,
A7, B8 and
B9. There is also a smaller and
more obscure network of expressways connecting to the highways.
One of
the most used is the B28 expressway,
connecting A4 near Zagreb to Bjelovar
, but also serving as the main shunpiking alternative to the A3. The Croatian highway network is
considered one of very good overall quality and excellent security,
winning several EUROTAP awards.
Croatia
has an extensive rail network, although because of historical
circumstances, some regions (notably Istria and even
more so Dubrovnik) are not accessible by train without passing
through neighbouring countries. Serious investment is needed
in the rail network over the coming decades to bring it up to
European standards in both speed and operational efficiency. All
rail services are operated by
Croatian
Railways ( ). The inter-city bus network (operated by private
operators) is extensively developed, with higher levels of coverage
and timetables than the railways.
Croatia
has three major international airports, located in Zagreb
, Split
and Dubrovnik
. Other important airports include Zadar
, Rijeka
(on the
island of Krk), Osijek
, Bol
, Lošinj
and Pula
.
Croatia Airlines is the national
airline and
flag carrier. The U.S.
Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has assessed the Government
of Croatia’s Civil Aviation Authority as not being in compliance
with International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) aviation
safety standards for oversight of Croatia’s air carrier operations.
An extensive system of ferries, operated by
Jadrolinija, serves Croatia's many islands and
links coastal cities. Ferry services to Italy are also
available.
Education
University of Zagreb
Primary education in Croatia starts at the age of six or seven and
consists of eight grades. In 2007 a law was passed to increase free
but not compulsory education until eighteen years of age.
Compulsory education consists of eight grades ( Elementary School
)Secondary education is provided by
gymnasiums and
vocational schools.
Croatia
has eight universities, the University of Zagreb
, University of Split
, University of
Rijeka, University of
Osijek, University of Zadar,
University of Dubrovnik the
University of Pula and Dubrovnik International
University.The
University
of Zadar, the first University in Croatia, was founded in 1396
and remained active until 1807, when other institutions of higher
education took over until the foundation of the renewed University
of Zadar in 2002. The University of Zagreb, founded in 1669, is the
oldest continuously operating University in
Southeastern Europe. There are also
polytechnic and
higher education institutions.
Culture
Croatian culture is the result of a
fourteen century-long history
which has seen the development of many cities and monuments. The
country includes
seven World
Heritage sites and eight national parks. Croatia is also the
birthplace of a number of
historical figures. Included among
the
notable people are three
Nobel prize winners and numerous
inventors.
Some of the world's first
fountain pens
came from Croatia. Croatia also has a place in the history of
clothing as the origin of the
necktie
(
kravata). The country has a long
artistic, literary
and
musical tradition. Also of
interest is the diverse nature of
Croatian cuisine and the famous Croatian
Traditional gift
Licitar.
Sport
Croatia has a reputation of producing gifted athletes in a diverse
range of sports. The most popular sports in Croatia are
football,
handball,
basketball,
water polo,
tennis, and
skiing.
The
Croatian national
football team won a bronze medal in the
1998 FIFA World Cup and
Davor Šuker won the
Golden Boot as the top goal scorer.
The national football team has also played in the quarter-finals of
the
1996 European Championships and
the
2008 European Championships. The
team is currently ranked 10th in the
FIFA World Rankings (as of November
2009). The most popular football players are
Luka Modrić,
Darijo
Srna,
Ivica Olić and
Eduardo.
The
Croatia national
handball team is a two-time Olympic Champion (
1996 and
2004). The team also
won a gold medal at the
2003 World Men's Handball
Championship, and silver medals in the
1995,
2003 and
2009 World
Championships. Croatia won bronze medal in
1994 European
Championships and silver in
2008.
RK Zagreb was a 1992 and 1993
European champion and 4 times a
runner-up (1995, 1997, 1998 and 1999). Croatian players
Ivano Balić,
Igor
Vori and
Domagoj Duvnjak are
currently among the best handball players in the world.
The
Croatian national
basketball team won a silver medal at the
1992 Olympic basketball
tournament, bronze medal at the
1994 FIBA World Championship
and bronze medals at
EuroBasket 1993
and
EuroBasket 1995. Croatian
basketball clubs were
Euroleague
champions 5 times:
KK Split three times (in
1989, 1990 and 1991) and
KK Cibona in 1985
and 1986.
Croatian basketball players such as Dražen Petrović, Krešimir Ćosić and Toni Kukoč were amongst the first foreign
players to succeed in the NBA in the United States
.
The
Croatia national
water polo team won a gold medal at the
2007 FINA
World Championships and bronze medal in
2009. The team also won a silver medal at the
1996 Olympic water polo
tournament and silver medals in the 1999 and 2003 European
Championships. Croatian water polo clubs were 13 times
LEN Euroleague champions.
HAVK Mladost from Zagreb was a seven time
European Champion (in 1968, 1969, 1970, 1972, 1990, 1991 and 1996)
and was awarded the title
Best Club of the 20th Century by
the
LEN.
VK Jug from Dubrovnik and
VK
Jadran from Split were both three time European
champions.
The
Croatian Davis Cup team
(
Ivan Ljubičić,
Mario Ančić and
Ivo Karlović with coach
Nikola Pilić) won the
2005 Davis Cup tournament and reached
semifinals in
2009 tournament
(
Marin Čilić and Ivo Karlović
with coach
Goran Prpić). The tennis
player
Goran Ivanišević
is one of the country's most popular sportsmen. Ivanišević won the
2001
Wimbledon Men's singles title and reached number 2 spot in
ATP Rankings in July 1994. Ivan
Ljubičić reached number 3 spot in ATP Rankings in May 2006.
Iva Majoli won the
1997 Roland Garros
Women's Singles title. Currently the best Croatian tennis
player is Marin Čilić ranked 14th as of November 16, 2009.
Janica Kostelić is the most
successful female
alpine ski racer in
the history of the
Winter Olympic
Games. She is the only woman to win four gold medals in alpine
skiing at the
Winter Olympics Alpine
skiing events (in
2002 and
2006), and the
only woman to win three alpine skiing gold medals in one Olympics
(
2002).
She also won two slilver medals in
2006. Janica was
the
World Cup overall
champion in
2001,
2003, and
2006. On February 5, 2006 Janica
became the second female skier to win all five disciplines in one
season. She also holds the record for the highest number of points
in one World Cup season. In 2006 she won
Laureus
World Sports Award for Sportswoman of the Year. Her elder
brother
Ivica Kostelić is
2003 slalom
World Champion and
2006 Olympic silver medalist in combined.
Blanka Vlašić is the
best-known Croatian
track and
field athlete who specialises in the
high
jump. She is
2007 and
2009 World Champion. Blanka is also
2008
World Indoor Champion and
2008 Olympic silver medalist. Her personal best is 2.08 m
(which is only 1 cm less than the world record) set in Zagreb
at August 31, 2009.
Croatia women's
national volleyball team won silver medals three times at
European Volleyball
Championship in
1995,
1997 and
1999.
Other Croatian well-known athletes are
Duje Draganja,
Gordan Kožulj,
Sanja Jovanović and
Đurđica Bjedov in
swimming,
Zoran
Primorac,
Dragutin Šurbek,
Antun Stipančić and
Tamara Boroš in
table tennis,
Filip
Ude in
gymnastics,
Siniša and
Nikša Skelin in
rowing,
Martina
Zubčić and
Sandra Šarić
in
taekwondo,
Snježana Pejčić in
shooting,
Matija
Ljubek in
canoeing,
Željko Mavrović and
Mate Parlov in
boxing,
Branko Cikatić and
Mirko Filipović "Cro Cop" in
kickboxing and
UFC fighter
Goran Reljic.
See also
References
Further reading
- Agičić et al., Povijest i zemljopis
Hrvatske, priručnik za hrvatske manjinske škole (History
and Geography of
Croatia
, a handbook for Croatian minority
schools), Biblioteka Geographica Croatica, 292 pages,
Zagreb:2000 (ISBN 953-6235-40-4)
- Branka Magaš. "Croatia Through History: The Making of a Modern
European State" Saqi. November 2007, 680pp.
- Ivo Banac, The National Question in Yugoslavia: Origins,
History, Politics Cornell
University Press, 1984.
- Mirjana Kasapović (ed.), Hrvatska politika 1990.-2000.
Zagreb: Hrvatska politologija 2001.
- Pavol Demes and Jörg Forbrig (eds.), Reclaiming Democracy:
Civil Society and Electoral Change in Central and Eastern
Europe. German Marshall
Fund, 2007. ISBN 978-80-969639-0-4
- Sharon Fisher, Political Change in Post-Communist Slovakia and
Croatia: From Nationalist to Europeanist. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006 ISBN 1 4039 7286
9
External links
- Government
- General information
- Tourism
- Other
National Park (1979)
in the Historic Centre of Poreč
(1997)
(1997)
in Šibenik
(2000)
Top topics
Wikis
Quiz
Facts
Map
Misc
Timeline
Search
