The Republic of Serbia, together with the Republic of Montenegro, is a constituent part of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. It contains two autonomous provinces: Vojvodina and Kosovo and Metohija. Belgrade is the capital city . With a population of two millions, it is the administrative, economic and cultural heart of Serbia and Yugoslavia.
The Republic of Serbia is a democratic state of all citizens who live on its territory. Its history and achievements make it an integral part of contemporary civilization and the international community.
Serbia is located in the central part of the Balkan Peninsula, on the most important route linking Europe and Asia, occupying an area of 88, 361 sq. km. Serbia is in the West European time zone (one hour ahead of Greenwich time). Its climate is temperate continental, with a gradual transition between the four seasons of the year.
Serbia is referred to as the cross-roads of Europe. The international roads and railways passing down its river valleys make up the shortest link between Western and Central Europe, on the one side, and the Middle East, Asia and Africa, on the other. Hence the geopolitical importance of its territory . These roads follow the course of the valley of the river Morava, splitting in two near the city of Nis. One track follows the valleys of the rivers Southern Morava and Vardar to Thessaloniki; the other, the river Nisava to Sofia and Istanbul.
Serbian rivers belong to the basins of the Black, Adriatic and Aegean Seas. Three of them, the Danube, Sava and Tisa, are navigable. The longest river is the Danube, which flows for 588 of its 2.857 kilometer course through Serbia. The Danube basin has always been important for Serbia. With the commissioning of the Rhine-Main-Danube Canal in September 1992, the Black Sea and the Near and Far Eastern ports have come much nearer to Europe. Serbia is linked to the Adriatic Sea and Montenegro via Belgrade-Bar railway.
Northern Serbia is mainly flat, while its central and southern areas consist of highlands and mountains. The flatlands are mainly in Vojvodina (the Pannonian Plain and its rim: Macva, the Sava Valley, the Morava Valley, Stig and the Negotin Marches in Eastern Serbia). 55 per cent of Serbia is arable land, and 27 per cent is forested. Of its mountains 15 reach heights of over 2,000 meters , the highest being Djeravica in the Prokletija range (2,656 m).
The length of Serbia's border is 2,397 km. To the East Serbia borders with Bulgaria, to the North East with Romania, to the North with Hungary, to the West with Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and to the South with Albania and Macedonia.
The ethnic population of the Republic of Serbia is highly varied, the result of a turbulent history in this part of the world. The majority of the population of Serbia are Serbs, but another 37 nationalities also live on its territory. All citizens have equal rights and responsibilities and enjoy full national equality. The Constitution of the Republic of Serbia guarantees the rights of the minorities, in accordance with the highest international standards. The last 1991 Census puts the population of Serbia at 9,779,000, which is 94,1 per cent of the population of Yugoslavia. The population density runs to 111 inhabitants per square km. Serbs make up 66 per cent of the population, Albanians 17 per cent, Hungarians 3.5 per cent, followed by Romanians, Romanies, Slovaks, Croats, Bulgarians, Turks, and others.
The official language in the Republic is Serbian and the alphabet in official use is Cyrillic, as well as Latin. In the areas inhabited by national minorities, the languages and alphabets of the minorities are in official use, as provided by law.
The main religion of Serbia is Christian Orthodox, the faith of the Serbian people. The Serbian Orthodox Church, which has been autonomous since 1219, has played an important role in the development and the preservation of the Serbian national identity. The Romanian, Bulgarian and the majority of the Romani population are also Christian Orthodox. Beside the Christian Orthodox population, there are also other religious communities in Serbia : Islamic, Roman Catholic, Protestant, Jewish and others.
Like the other South Slavic tribes, the Serbs came to the Balkans during the great migration of peoples in the 6th and 7th centuries AD. The first Serbian state was formed in the region of the Tara, Piva, and Upper Ibar rivers. Like most of the Balkans peninsula, it was under Byzantine rule until the end of the 12th century. When Stefan Nemanya, the founder of the Nemanyic dynasty, came to power in 1170, the Serbian state was renewed in Raska, and conditions ensured for the consolidation of a powerful and independent state in the Balkans. His son and successor Stevan was crowned as Serbia's first king. Son Rastko, who took the monastic vows as Sava, won independence for the Serbian Church from the Patriarch in Constantinople, and wrote the Nomocanon, the law codifying the ecclesiastic life of the Church, but also social relations in the state. Medieval Serbia, which, in political, economic and cultural terms, ranked among the highly developed societies of Medieval Europe, reached its climax in the 14th century, during the rule of Emperor Dusan. From that period is Emperor Dusan's Code of Law, a major legal accomplishment, unique among the feudal states of Europe at that time.
The Nomocanon, Dusan's Code of Law and the frescoes and architecture of the medieval monasteries that grace Serbia's countryside are eternal witnesses of a brilliant civilization of a people - the Serbian people.
Turkish conquest - Having defeated the Serbian army in the Battle of Kosovo in 1389, the Turks continued their conquests until they managed to capture the entire territory of the Serbian state in 1459. The Turkish empire ruled over Serbia for five centuries.
Serbian uprisings and independence Serbian resistance against the Ottoman domination culminated in the First and Second Serbian Uprisings in 1804 and 1815 respectively. As a result of these uprisings and subsequent wars against the Ottoman Empire, an independent Serbian state was formed which gained international recognition as Kingdom at the Congress of Berlin in 1878. The evolution of the Kingdom of Serbia was characterized by general progress in the economy, culture and the arts. With its integration into European trends in the second half of the 19th century, the first trade unions and political parties were formed. A palace coup in 1903 that brought to the throne king Petar Karadjordjevic, paved the way to parliamentary democracy in Serbia. The European educated liberal king translated John Stewart Mill's "On Liberty" into Serbian and gave his kingdom a democratic constitution, which ushered a period of unprecedented political freedom that was cut short by war.
First World War - The Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 eliminated Turkish domination of the Balkans. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914, served as a pretext for Austria - Hungary to attack Serbia, thus starting the First World War. The Serbian nation courageously defended the independence of its country and won great victories but, in the face of the superior enemy forces of Germany and Austria-Hungary, had to retreat from its national territory across Albania, later continuing the fight on the Salonica Front. In the course of this war, Serbia lost 1,264,000 out of a population of 4,529,000 , that is 28 per cent of its total population and 58 per cent of its adult male population. With these enormous sacrifices, Serbia made a significant contribution to Allied victory.
Kingdom of Yugoslavia - With the end of the First World War and the collapse of the Ottoman, German and Austro-Hungarian Empires, the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was proclaimed in December 1918, thereby fulfilling the aspirations of the South Slav ( Yugoslav ) peoples to live in a common state. However, the Croatian politicians opposed the new state. In 1929, in an unsuccessful attempt to deal with the challenge, King Aleksandar Karadjordjevic established a dictatorship and renamed the country to Yugoslavia. But the King was assassinated in 1934 by the Ustashi, a Croatian separatist Fascist organization and the Croatian problem continued to loom large.
Second World War - When in April 1941, Hitler occupied Yugoslavia he dismembered the country and created a puppet Fascist Independent State of Croatia under the Ustashi, to which he attached Bosnia and Herzegovina. This Fascist Croatia, committed the most heinous genocide against a people in which more than 750.000 Serbs, Jews and Gypsies were killed. The experience of this holocaust formed the background for the Civil War in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina that accompanied the destruction of Yugoslavia in 1991-1992. The harsh policies of the German occupation forces and the genocidal policies of the Croatian Ustashi regime generated powerful resistance movements, both nationalist and communist, among the Serbs. The Serbs rose in defense against the Croatian genocide and Nazi enslavement of Yugoslavia. Many joined the Partisan resistance ( the Peoples Liberation Army led by Josip Broz Tito) in a war of national liberation, contributing to Allied victory over Nazism. By the end of 1944, the Partisans, helped by the Russian Red Army, had liberated Serbia, and by May 1945, the remaining Yugoslav territories, joining forces with Allied troops in Hungary and Italy. Serbia and Yugoslavia were among the countries most devastated by the war: 1,700,000 ( 10,8 % of the population ) were dead, and the loss of national resources was estimated at 9.1 billion in U.S. dollars, at the prices of the time.
The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY) 1945-1990 - During the war, a revolutionary change of the system was proclaimed in 1943, abolishing the monarchy in favor of a republic, with Tito as the first president of new Yugoslavia. Thus, after World War II the period of the second, Socialist Yugoslavia ensued. From a predominantly agricultural country, Yugoslavia was transformed into a medium-developed industrial state, gaining political reputation for its support of world decolonization and its leadership role in the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries.
The break-up of the SFR Yugoslavia - The SFR Yugoslavia was a federal state. The federation consisted of six republics: Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia and Montenegro; and two autonomous provinces: Vojvodina and Kosovo and Metohija. The two autonomous provinces were part of the Republic of Serbia. By this administrative division and due to historical reasons, the Serbian people, the most numerous in Yugoslavia, lived in all six republics. A tendency to increase the power of Republics at the cost of federal authorities gained the momentum with the passing of the Constitution in 1974, which encouraged the growth of Croatian, Slovenian, Muslim and Albanian nationalism and secessionism.
In the course 1991-1992, Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina seceded from Yugoslavia through violence, while Macedonia separated peacefully. The destruction of Yugoslavia was helped by the powerful international forces that did not recognize the right of national self-determination for the Serbs who wanted to live in Yugoslavia. The secessionist republics quickly won international recognition, in blatant violation of internationally accepted principles of the inviolability of internationally recognized borders of sovereign states and of the conditions which states must satisfy in order to achieve international recognition .
Serbia and Montenegro chose to stay in Yugoslavia. At the joint session of the Assemblies of Yugoslavia, Serbia and Montenegro in Belgrade on April 27, 1992, the Serbs and Montenegrins adopted the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, thereby confirming the continuity of their common state since December 1, 1918.
According to the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia of 1990, Serbia is a democratic state of all citizens who live in it, grounded in freedom of expression, the rule of law and social justice. The Constitution guaranties personal, political, economic, national and cultural rights of its citizens.
Under the Constitution, Serbia is a single indivisible state with territorial integrity. It has three categories of territorial units: two autonomous provinces, 29 districts - units of local government, and the City of Belgrade. The two autonomous provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo-Metohija enjoy the rights of territorial and political autonomy. They have their own Parliaments, Executive Councils and administrative bodies with decision making powers provided by the Constitution. Within the 29 districts, the territorial organization of local government consists of 185 townships and 4 cities: Kragujevac, Nis, Novi Sad and Pristina .
With the democratic atmosphere created by constitutional changes in 1990, Serbia has engaged all its natural and human resources in bringing about a modern market economy, hastening political democratization and achieving economic and political integration with Europe and the world community.
Serbia is a state of parliamentary democracy. The Constitution provides for a multi-party presidential and parliamentary system. The stability of state authority rests on three connected and balanced institutions: the President of the Republic, the Parliament and the Government.
The President of Serbia and the Parliament are elected in multi party elections, by direct secret ballot of all enfranchised citizens.
Serbia is represented by the President of the Republic. In the presidential multi-party elections in 1990 and again in 1992, Slobodan Milosevic was elected the President of Serbia, each time winning a decisive victory. Mr. Milosevic was the President of Serbia until 23 July 1997, when he was elected President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
The Parliament is the Republic's constituent and legislative body. It has 250 deputies. The Parliament elects the Government, which, together with the President, form the executive power in Serbia. The judiciary is independent.
The first elections for Serbia's Parliament were held in December 1990. Subsequently, political conditions necessitated two early elections: in December 1992, and in December 1993. The new elections for the President and the Parliament of Serbia are scheduled for September 21, 1997.
There are 157 officially registered political parties, organizations, movements and coalitions in Serbia. They differ in objectives, programs, number of followers and influence. With the growth of parliamentary democracy and the multi-party system, a critical tolerance of values, political programs, national and religious interests has become more evident.
In Serbia, the rights and freedoms of national minorities are respected. Members of national minorities have constitutional right to political association, cultural institutions, education and access to information in their own language, to elect and be elected to local, republican and federal government, to engage in business and other activities. Minorities in Serbia enjoy rights in accordance with the established international standards.
Members of national minorities in Serbia develop their ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious identity, without fear of assimilation against their will. They are ensured material conditions for development. Vojvodina, where the largest number of nations live, is a developed region. Kosovo and Metohija, where the Albanian population is concentrated, although economically under-developed, has had a higher rate of development in recent years than any other part of Serbia. The Albanians in Kosovo and Metohija, however, do not recognize the Republic of Serbia in which they live, nor its Constitution. Under pressure from separatist political leaders and help from outside, the Albanian minority boycott all state institutions, through which they could achieve their rights and freedoms. They refuse to recognize the state authorities, to pay taxes or allow their children to be educated in their mother tongue in state schools with curricula in force for a1l students in Serbia. They boycott democratic elections in which they could elect their legitimate representatives to local, republican and federal government.
An extreme and aggressive Albanian nationalism at work in Kosovo and Metohija, accompanied by a demographic explosion, has changed the demographic face of that Province. The Albanian population has the highest birth rate in Europe. During World War Two, Hitler annexed Kosovo to Albania, a Fascist state under whose rule large numbers of Serbs and Montenegrins were expelled from Kosovo, while Albanians from Albania were settled there. By Order No. 343 of the Commissar of Internal Affairs of 5 March, 1945, Tito barred those Serbs and Montenegrins from returning to their homes. Then, during the seventies, over 200,000 Serbs were forced to leave Kosovo under the pressure of Albanian terror. Equally significant, since 1945, with the blessing of the Yugoslav authorities, between 350,000 and 400,000 Albanian refugees from Albania were settled there. In this way, the ethnic make-up of Kosovo and Metohija was changed and conditions were created for Albanians to appear on the international political scene with demands for a separate state. Refugees
The dismemberment of Yugoslavia, accompanied by a civil war in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, generated an exodus of over two million Serbian refugees who sought shelter in Serbia, Europe and overseas. Some fled to save their lives and those of their children before the horrors of war, while others were cruelly driven out of their homes. In Croatia, for example, ten thousand Serbian houses were blown up, according to the findings of the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights. Croatia today is ethnically homogenous, having successfully conducted the largest ethnic cleansing of the Yugoslav crisis, reducing the Serbian population there from 650.000 to 100.000 people.
Currently, 705.667 refugees are living in Serbia. 451.124 were registered from May 1991 to July 1995, and 254.498 from August to December 1995. About 12% are not Serbs, but Muslims, Croats, and members of other ethnic groups. About 90% are staying with families, relatives and friends, and only about 10% in 700 collective centers in Serbia. The majority live in poverty, on insufficient domestic budget of their hosts and state aid. The international community seems to have turned a deaf ear to the needs of these refugees who have found temporary shelter in Serbia.
At the height of international sanctions, imposed against Serbia and Montenegro by the Security Counsel of the United Nations on 30 May 1992 on the basis of one-sided representation of the Yugoslav role in the conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina, when all economic activity was brought to a virtual stand-still, Yugoslavia and Serbia in January 1994 initiated an economic and financial reform. The chief purpose of this reform was to halt the runaway inflation and stabilize the national currency, to be followed by revitalization of production and a gradual rise in the standard of living. The person behind these reforms was Dr. Dragoslav Avramovic, a bank expert with many years of experience in international financial institutions.
The linchpin of the monetary reconstruction program and economic recovery was the new dinar, which was given parity value with the German mark, had a gold base in hard currency and was convertible. The economic recovery of the country was accompanied by a new tax system which took in the hitherto 'gray economy' that had benefited most from the inflationary taxation of the population at large. Public spending in health, science, education, the administration and the army was drastically cut back. The state administration and public companies were rationalized. Firms were relieved of their social welfare obligations, which were taken over by the state.
The Government of Serbia, following its inauguration in mid-March 1994, under prime-minister Mirko Marjanovic, accepted Dr. Avramovic's program as the pivotal point of its activity. It carried out a thorough monetary and economic reconstruction of the entire system. Serbia thus, under most unfavorable circumstances, managed to retain its infrastructure as the basis for future economic development and reintegration into European and the world market.
The successful implementation of the economic recovery program is based on the market model, which relies on free competition, entrepreneurship and business initiative, all grounded in the Constitution which guarantees the equality of all forms of ownership. Transformation of ownership has been taking place in Serbia, capital market is being created and other modern financial institutions introduced.
Serbia possesses important sources of energy, raw materials and production capacities, particularly electric energy which for many years has been one of its chief exports. Hydroelectric power plants on the Danube, Drina, Vlasina and Lim rivers and the thermal power plants in Obrenovac, Kostolac and Obilic, produce 32,463 million kWh. Mining in Serbia was developed in the Middle Ages, when sizable quantities of silver, gold and lead were extracted. Today, The Republic is a major producer of lead, copper and zinc, and of intermediate and finished products of these and other metals.
According to all the indices, present-day Serbia is a medium-developed industrial country with extensive capacities for food, textile and metal-processing industries. Other large industries include the manufacturing of cars, agricultural machinery and tractors, household appliances, mineral fertilizers, the petro-chemical and pharmaceutical industries .
Serbia has an active regional development policy that encourages the development in Kosovo and Metohija and other insufficiently developed regions. Kosovo and Metohija has made significant progress in economic development, mainly due to the assistance from the Republic and the Federation.
Most of the land in Serbia is privately owned. About 1,700.000 farmers hold 82 per cent of the arable land. Serbia produces a marked surplus of food. Wheat, maize, oil, sugar, fruit, wine and meat are important export articles today.
The express concern of the state for agricultural and food industry, gives this branch of the economy priority though legislation and economic measures, designed to strengthen agricultural production as a critically important factor in economic prosperity.
Thanks to a high degree of mechanization, the use of technology and successful selection and production of high-yield seeds, agricultural institutes in Serbia have introduced some of the most productive types of wheat, maize and sunflower seed that return high yields. In 1990, for example, the average yield of these cultures in tons per hectare was: wheat 4.41, maize 5.76, sunflower 2.17 and sugarbeet 44.90.
Situated at the confluence of the Danube and Sava rivers, Belgrade is an ancient settlement, whose oldest archaeological findings go back to the fifth millennium BC. It was founded as Singidunum by a Celtic tribe in the third century BC, while the first mention of Belgrade dates to 989. Throughout its long and turbulent history, Belgrade was captured by forty armies and rose thirty-eight times from the ashes.
Today, Belgrade is the political and administrative capital of Serbia and Yugoslavia. With its two million inhabitants, the city is of a major importance in traffic communications. Besides its significance as a road and rail junction, Belgrade is an important international river-to-sea and air port and telecommunications center. It possesses important agricultural and industrial capacities, particularly in the metal, ferrous metal and electronic industries, followed by trade and banking. The greater Belgrade area, with the cities of Smederevo and Pancevo, encompass 2000 square meters of free trade zone located on the banks of the Danube. Thirty per cent of Serbia's GNP is earned in Belgrade.
Belgrade is the capital of the Serbian culture. It has the greatest concentration of science and art institutions of national importance. It is the seat of the Serbian Academy of Science and Arts (SASA), founded in 1886 as the Serbian Royal Academy; Serbian National Library, founded in 1832; National Museum, founded in 1841 and National Theatre, founded in 1869. The city is also the seat of Belgrade University, founded in 1808 as the Great School and the University of Arts.
Belgrade has a status of a special district in Serbia with its autonomous authorities: the City Council, Mayor and City Government. Its territory is divided into 16 municipalities, and with its local government.
The capital of Serbia is an attractive place for domestic and foreign tourists.
