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75-575: A similar surname of peoples from the former Yugoslavia is Abramović . Some people with these names include: Abramowicz (Polish) Abramovich ( Russian : Абрамо́вич ) Yugoslavia Yugoslavia ( / ˌ j uː ɡ oʊ ˈ s l ɑː v i ə / ; lit.   ' Land of the South Slavs ' ) was a country in Southeast and Central Europe that existed from 1918 to 1992. It came into existence following World War I , under

150-537: A new constitution and relinquished his dictatorship in 1931. However, Alexander's policies later encountered opposition from other European powers stemming from developments in Italy and Germany, where Fascists and Nazis rose to power, and the Soviet Union , where Joseph Stalin became absolute ruler. None of these three regimes favored the policy pursued by Alexander I. In fact, Italy and Germany wanted to revise

225-580: A Kosovar republic. This angered Serbia's leadership which proceeded to use police force and later, federal police troops to restore civil order. In January 1990, the extraordinary 14th Congress of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia was convened, where the Serbian and Slovenian delegations argued over the future of the League of Communists and Yugoslavia. The Serbian delegation, led by Milošević, insisted on

300-455: A close relationship between the two Communist countries, and enable Yugoslavia to start a civil war in Greece and use Albania and Bulgaria as bases. Stalin vetoed this agreement and it was never realised. The break between Belgrade and Moscow was now imminent. Yugoslavia solved the national issue of nations and nationalities (national minorities) in a way that all nations and nationalities had

375-597: A common state for all South Slavic peoples, emerged in the late 17th century and gained prominence through the Illyrian Movement of the 19th century. The name was created by the combination of the Slavic words jug ("south") and Slaveni / Sloveni (Slavs). Moves towards the formal creation of Yugoslavia accelerated after the 1917 Corfu Declaration between the Yugoslav Committee and

450-524: A course to independence. On 6 August 1999, Montenegro drafted a plan wherein Yugoslavia would have been supplanted by the "Association of the States of Serbia and Montenegro", intended to also grant Montenegro autonomy over its foreign ministry, currency, and military for eventual secession. The Clinton administration expressed support, but urged Montenegro to remain in union. On 15 March, 2002, under

525-588: A dubious traffic incident after he started to complain about Tito's politics. Minister of the interior Aleksandar Ranković lost all of his titles and rights after a major disagreement with Tito regarding state politics. Some influential ministers in government, such as Edvard Kardelj or Stane Dolanc , were more important than the Prime Minister. First cracks in the tightly governed system surfaced when students in Belgrade and several other cities joined

600-533: A federation (this date was celebrated as Republic Day after the war). The Yugoslav Partisans were able to expel the Axis from Serbia in 1944 and the rest of Yugoslavia in 1945. The Red Army provided limited assistance with the liberation of Belgrade and withdrew after the war was over. In May 1945, the Partisans met with Allied forces outside former Yugoslav borders, after also taking over Trieste and parts of

675-597: A free fall and social programmes collapsed; creating within the population an atmosphere of social despair and hopelessness. This was a critical turning point in the events to follow. After Tito's death on 4 May 1980, ethnic tensions grew in Yugoslavia. The legacy of the Constitution of 1974 threw the system of decision-making into a state of paralysis, made all the more hopeless as the conflict of interests became irreconcilable. The Albanian majority in Kosovo demanded

750-593: A growing desire for regime change and support for opposition within Serbia. Strain with Serbia over economic policy caused Montenegro to adopt the Deutsche Mark in 1996 while waiting for the European Community to formalise a European currency. After Bulatović stepped down as Montenegrin president in 1998, the new president Milo Đukanović opposed Milošević (now Yugoslav President) and set Montenegro on

825-542: A minimum: Serbia proper, then-loyal Montenegro, Vojvodina, and Kosovo. As a result of these events, ethnic Albanian miners in Kosovo organised the 1989 Kosovo miners' strike , which dovetailed into an ethnic conflict between the Albanians and the non-Albanians in the province. At around 80% of the population of Kosovo in the 1980s , ethnic-Albanians were the majority. With Milošević gaining control over Kosovo in 1989,

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900-476: A plain tricolour, similar to Serbia's but longer, and with a lighter blue for its centre stripe, marking a distinction between the two republics which had exactly the same flag during the Communist era. This flag would be in place until 2004. Montenegro's continued union with Serbia provided legitimacy to the continuation of a Yugoslav state, important to Serbia as the continuation of a Yugoslav state would allow

975-647: A policy of "one person, one vote" which would empower the plurality population, the Serbs . In turn, the Slovenian delegation, supported by Croats, sought to reform Yugoslavia by devolving even more power to republics, but were voted down. As a result, the Slovene and Croatian delegations left the Congress and the all-Yugoslav Communist party was dissolved. The constitutional crisis that inevitably followed resulted in

1050-513: A revival of greater Serbian hegemonism. Through a series of moves known as the " anti-bureaucratic revolution ", Milošević succeeded in reducing the autonomy of Vojvodina and of Kosovo and Metohija, but both entities retained a vote in the Yugoslav Presidency Council. The very instrument that reduced Serbian influence before was now used to increase it: in the eight-member Council, Serbia could now count on four votes at

1125-530: A rise of nationalism in all republics: Slovenia and Croatia voiced demands for looser ties within the federation. Following the fall of communism in Eastern Europe, each of the republics held multi-party elections in 1990. Slovenia and Croatia held the elections in April since their communist parties chose to cede power peacefully. Other Yugoslav republics—especially Serbia—were more or less dissatisfied with

1200-597: The 2006 Montenegrin independence referendum . Upon entry into the FRY, Montenegro was led by President Momir Bulatović , a former member of the Communist Party in Yugoslavia and an ally of Serbian President Slobodan Milošević , whom Bulatović helped gain power during the Anti-Bureaucratic Revolution , in which he and Milošević gained power in their respective republics. In the final years of

1275-636: The Conference of Ambassadors in Paris . The official name of the state was changed to Kingdom of Yugoslavia on 3 October 1929. The kingdom was invaded and occupied by the Axis powers in April 1941. In 1943, Democratic Federal Yugoslavia was proclaimed by the Partisan resistance . In 1944, King Peter II , then living in exile , recognised it as the legitimate government. After a communist government

1350-547: The European Community if Montenegro separated from Yugoslavia. However, Bulatović's brief endorsement of Montenegrin independence ended due to pressure from Serbia. In 1992, Montenegro joined the FRY after a referendum took place on 1 March of that year. In the same year, the capital Titograd (named after former Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito ) was renamed to its pre-communist name of Podgorica . In 1993, Montenegro abandoned its former Communist-era flag and adopted

1425-748: The European Union 's auspices, an agreement was formed that would officially dissolve Yugoslavia. The agreement permitted Montenegro to continue to use the Euro instead of the Yugoslav dinar . In 2003, the FR Yugoslavia became a confederacy under the name "Serbia and Montenegro" and granted more autonomy to Montenegro with only defense and foreign policy remaining a responsibility for the central government. In 2006, Montenegro held an independence referendum . 55% voted in favor of independence, but this

1500-526: The Non-Aligned Movement in 1961, which remained the official affiliation of the country until it dissolved. On 7 April 1963, the nation changed its official name to Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and Josip Broz Tito was named President for life . In the SFRY, each republic and province had its own constitution, supreme court, parliament, president and prime minister. At the top of

1575-620: The Yugoslav Wars . From 1993 to 2017, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia tried political and military leaders from the former Yugoslavia for war crimes , genocide, and other crimes committed during those wars. After the breakup, the republics of Montenegro and Serbia formed a reduced federative state, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY). This state aspired to

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1650-536: The 1974 constitution as weakening Serbia's influence and jeopardising the unity of the country by allowing the republics the right to separate. According to official statistics, from the 1950s to the early 1980s, Yugoslavia was among the fastest growing countries, approaching the ranges reported in South Korea and other countries undergoing an economic miracle . The unique socialist system in Yugoslavia, where factories were worker cooperatives and decision-making

1725-567: The Albanians of Kosovo and Hungarians of Vojvodina. Both provinces were afforded much of the same status as the six republics of Yugoslavia, though they could not secede. Vojvodina and Kosovo formed the provinces of the Republic of Serbia but also formed part of the federation, which led to the unique situation in which Central Serbia did not have its own assembly but a joint assembly with its provinces represented in it. Albanian and Hungarian became nationally recognised minority languages, and

1800-788: The Croatian Defence minister Martin Špegelj and two unidentified men. The video, filmed by the Yugoslav counter-intelligence ( KOS, Kontra-obavještajna služba ), showed Špegel announcing that they were at war with the army and giving instructions about arms smuggling as well as methods of dealing with the Yugoslav Army's officers stationed in Croatian cities. Serbia and JNA used this discovery of Croatian rearmament for propaganda purposes. Guns were also fired from army bases through Croatia. Elsewhere, tensions were running high. In

1875-479: The Croatian armed forces ("police") and civilians mark the beginning of the Yugoslav war that inflamed the region. Similarly, the attempt to replace Yugoslav frontier police by Slovene police forces provoked regional armed conflicts which ended with a minimal number of victims. A similar attempt in Bosnia and Herzegovina led to a war that lasted more than three years (see below). The results of all these conflicts were

1950-638: The Dalmatian coast towards the interior almost a year before Croatian leadership made any move towards independence. These uprisings were more or less discreetly backed by the Serb-dominated federal army (JNA). The Serbs in Croatia proclaimed "Serb autonomous areas", which were later united into the Republic of Serb Krajina . The federal army tried to disarm the territorial defence forces of Slovenia (the republics had their local defence forces similar to

2025-459: The Home Guard) in 1990 but was not completely successful. Still, Slovenia began to covertly import arms to replenish its armed forces. Croatia also embarked upon the illegal importation of arms, (following the disarmament of the republics' armed forces by the federal army) mainly from Hungary. These activities were under constant surveillance and produced a video of a secret meeting between

2100-538: The Marshall plan. However, in 1948 Tito broke decisively with Stalin on other issues, making Yugoslavia an independent communist state. Yugoslavia requested American aid. American leaders were internally divided, but finally agreed and began sending money on a small scale in 1949, and on a much larger scale 1950–53. The American aid was not part of the Marshall plan. Tito criticised both Eastern Bloc and NATO nations and, together with India and other countries, started

2175-556: The SFRY were the socialist republics of Bosnia and Herzegovina , Croatia , Macedonia , Montenegro , Serbia , and Slovenia . Within Serbia were the two socialist autonomous provinces, Kosovo and Vojvodina , which following the adoption of 1974 Yugoslav Constitution were largely equal to the other members of the federation. After an economic and political crisis and the rise of nationalism and ethnic conflicts following Tito's death in 1980, Yugoslavia broke up along its republics' borders, at first into five countries, leading to

2250-433: The SFRY's existence, Bulatović had supported Milošević's demands for a "one-member, one-vote" system in the Communist party congress which would have given numerical superiority to their cohort in the congress. This fostered the collapse of the Communist Party and later the SFRY. Bulatović began to show reluctance to remain in a union with Serbia when countries like Italy offered Montenegro the possibility of quick access into

2325-486: The Serbo-Croat of Bosnia and Montenegro altered to a form based on the speech of the local people and not on the standards of Zagreb and Belgrade. In Slovenia the recognized minorities were Hungarians and Italians. The fact that these autonomous provinces held the same voting power as the republics but unlike other republics could not legally separate from Yugoslavia satisfied Croatia and Slovenia, but in Serbia and in

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2400-501: The Serbs (having in mind Croatian Serbs) should also have a right to self-determination. Republic of Montenegro (1992%E2%80%932006) The Republic of Montenegro ( Serbian : Република Црна Гора , romanized :  Republika Crna Gora ) was a constituent federated state of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and then Serbia and Montenegro between 1992 and 2006. The declaration of independence of Montenegro in 2006 ended

2475-686: The Yugoslav government were the President (Tito), the federal Prime Minister, and the federal Parliament (a collective Presidency was formed after Tito's death in 1980). Also important were the Communist Party general secretaries for each republic and province, and the general secretary of Central Committee of the Communist Party. Tito was the most powerful person in the country, followed by republican and provincial premiers and presidents, and Communist Party presidents. Slobodan Penezić Krcun, Tito's chief of secret police in Serbia, fell victim to

2550-539: The actual number of dead was about 1 million. On 11 November 1945, elections were held with only the Communist-led People's Front appearing on the ballot, securing all 354 seats. On 29 November, while still in exile, King Peter II was deposed by Yugoslavia's Constituent Assembly , and the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia was declared. However, he refused to abdicate. Marshal Tito

2625-510: The almost total emigration of the Serbs from all three regions, the massive displacement of the populations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the establishment of the three new independent states. The separation of Macedonia was peaceful, although the Yugoslav Army occupied the peak of the Straža mountain on Macedonian soil. Serbian uprisings in Croatia began in August 1990 by blocking roads leading from

2700-560: The constitution was heavily amended to replace the emphasis on democratic centralism with workers' self-management and decentralization . The Communist Party was renamed to the League of Communists and adopted Titoism at its congress the previous year . All the Communist European Countries had deferred to Stalin and rejected the Marshall Plan aid in 1947. Tito, at first went along and rejected

2775-466: The control of the Communist Party, and on recognition of the multiple nationalities. The flags of the republics used versions of the red flag or Slavic tricolor , with a red star in the centre or in the canton. Tito's regional goal was to expand south and take control of Albania and parts of Greece. In 1947, negotiations between Yugoslavia and Bulgaria led to the Bled agreement , which proposed to form

2850-477: The country and responded in a manner to appease both Croats and Serbs: he ordered the arrest of the Croatian Spring protestors while at the same time conceding to some of their demands. Following the 1974 Yugoslav Constitution , Serbia's influence in the country was significantly reduced, while its autonomous provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo were granted greater autonomy, along with greater rights for

2925-496: The country were occupied by Bulgaria , Hungary, and Italy. From 1941 to 1945, the Croatian Ustaše regime persecuted and murdered around 300,000 Serbs, along with at least 30,000 Jews and Roma; hundreds of thousands of Serbs were also expelled and another 200,000-300,000 were forced to convert to Catholicism . From the start, the Yugoslav resistance forces consisted of two factions: the communist-led Yugoslav Partisans and

3000-524: The decision, while all other republics, Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, voted against. The tie delayed an escalation of conflicts, but not for long. Following the first multi-party election results, in the autumn of 1990, the republics of Slovenia and Croatia proposed transforming Yugoslavia into a loose confederation of six republics. By this proposal, republics would have right to self-determination. However Milošević rejected all such proposals, arguing that like Slovenes and Croats,

3075-488: The democratisation in two of the republics and proposed different sanctions (e.g. Serbian "customs tax" for Slovene products) against the two, but as the year progressed, other republics' communist parties saw the inevitability of the democratisation process. In December, as the last member of the federation, Serbia held parliamentary elections confirming the rule of former communists in the republic. Slovenia and Croatia elected governments oriented towards greater autonomy of

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3150-550: The ex-Yugoslav state. After the collapse of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY), the remaining republics of Montenegro and Serbia agreed to the formation of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) which officially abandoned communism and nominally endorsed democratic institutions. Montenegro was a constituent republic of the FRY and its successor state until June 2006 when Montenegro declared independence from Serbia and Montenegro following

3225-649: The exiled royal government and the Allies , but they soon focused increasingly on combating the Partisans rather than the occupying Axis forces. By the end of the war, the Chetnik movement transformed into a collaborationist Serb nationalist militia completely dependent on Axis supplies. The Chetniks also persecuted and killed Muslims and Croats , with an estimated 50,000-68,000 victims (of which 41,000 were civilians). The highly mobile Partisans, however, carried on their guerrilla warfare with great success. Most notable of

3300-493: The federation to lay claim to former Yugoslav territory in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia populated by Serbs. Also Montenegro had access to the sea which kept Serbia's sovereign body from being landlocked and allowed for a navy (merchant and military) to exist. Over time, the domineering nature of President Milošević and his allies within the federation provoked ordinary Montenegrins to shift towards independence, while creating

3375-605: The government of the Kingdom of Serbia . The country was formed in 1918 immediately after World War I as the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes by union of the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs and the Kingdom of Serbia . It was commonly referred to at the time as a " Versailles state". Later, King Alexander I renamed the country to Yugoslavia in 1929. On 20 June 1928, Serb deputy Puniša Račić shot at five members of

3450-627: The international treaties signed after World War I, and the Soviets were determined to regain their positions in Europe and pursue a more active international policy. Alexander attempted to create a centralised Yugoslavia. He decided to abolish Yugoslavia's historic regions, and new internal boundaries were drawn for provinces or banovinas. The banovinas were named after rivers. Many politicians were jailed or kept under police surveillance. During his reign, communist movements were restricted. The king

3525-541: The invading German forces. More than 300,000 Yugoslav officers and soldiers were taken prisoner. The Axis Powers occupied Yugoslavia and split it up. The Independent State of Croatia was established as a Nazi satellite state, ruled by the fascist militia known as the Ustaše that came into existence in 1929, but was relatively limited in its activities until 1941. German troops occupied Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as part of Serbia and Slovenia , while other parts of

3600-580: The late 1930s was marked by growing intolerance between the principal figures, by the aggressive attitude of the totalitarian regimes, and by the certainty that the order set up after World War I was losing its strongholds and its sponsors their strength. Supported and pressured by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany , Croatian leader Vladko Maček and his party managed the creation of the Banovina of Croatia (Autonomous Region with significant internal self-government) in 1939. The agreement specified that Croatia

3675-575: The name of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes from the merger of the Kingdom of Serbia with the provisional State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs , and constituted the first union of South Slavic peoples as a sovereign state , following centuries of foreign rule over the region under the Ottoman Empire and the Habsburg monarchy . Peter I of Serbia was its first sovereign . The kingdom gained international recognition on 13 July 1922 at

3750-450: The new autonomous province of Kosovo, reaction was different. Serbs saw the new constitution as conceding to Croat and ethnic Albanian nationalists. Ethnic Albanians in Kosovo saw the creation of an autonomous province as not being enough, and demanded that Kosovo become a constituent republic with the right to separate from Yugoslavia. This created tensions within the Communist leadership, particularly among Communist Serb officials who viewed

3825-498: The opposition Croatian Peasant Party in the National Assembly , resulting in the death of two deputies on the spot and that of leader Stjepan Radić a few weeks later. On 6 January 1929, King Alexander I got rid of the constitution , banned national political parties , assumed executive power , and renamed the country Yugoslavia. He hoped to curb separatist tendencies and mitigate nationalist passions. He imposed

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3900-534: The original residency changed drastically leaving only a minimum number of Serbians in the region. The number of Serbs in Kosovo was quickly declining for several reasons, among them the ever-increasing ethnic tensions and subsequent emigration from the area. Meanwhile, Slovenia , under the presidency of Milan Kučan , and Croatia supported the Albanian miners and their struggle for formal recognition. Initial strikes turned into widespread demonstrations demanding

3975-553: The public protest and incarcerated the leaders, though many key Croatian representatives in the Party silently supported this cause. As a result, a new Constitution was ratified in 1974, which gave more rights to the individual republics in Yugoslavia and provinces in Serbia. After the Yugoslav Partisans took over the country at the end of WWII, nationalism was banned from being publicly promoted. Overall relative peace

4050-522: The regions of Kosovo and Vojvodina was reduced by the 1974 Constitution. Because its two autonomous provinces had de facto prerogatives of full-fledged republics, Serbia found that its hands were tied, for the republican government was restricted in making and carrying out decisions that would apply to the provinces. Since the provinces had a vote in the Federal Presidency Council (an eight-member council composed of representatives from

4125-452: The republics (under Milan Kučan and Franjo Tuđman , respectively). Serbia and Montenegro elected candidates who favoured Yugoslav unity. The Croat quest for independence led to large Serb communities within Croatia rebelling and trying to secede from the Croat republic. Serbs in Croatia would not accept the status of a national minority in a sovereign Croatia since they would be demoted from

4200-472: The royalist Chetniks , with the former receiving Allied recognition at the Tehran conference (1943). The heavily pro-Serbian Chetniks were led by Draža Mihajlović , while the pan-Yugoslav oriented Partisans were led by Josip Broz Tito . The Partisans initiated a guerrilla campaign that developed into the largest resistance army in occupied Western and Central Europe. The Chetniks were initially supported by

4275-614: The same fate. In other words, in less than two years "the trigger mechanism" (under the Financial Operations Act) had led to the layoff of more than 600,000 workers out of a total industrial workforce of the order of 2.7 million. An additional 20% of the work force, or half a million people, were not paid wages during the early months of 1990 as enterprises sought to avoid bankruptcy. The largest concentrations of bankrupt firms and lay-offs were in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia and Kosovo. Real earnings were in

4350-543: The same month, the Army leaders met with the Presidency of Yugoslavia in an attempt to get them to declare a state of emergency which would allow for the army to take control of the country. The army was seen as an arm of the Serbian government by that time so the consequence feared by the other republics was to be total Serbian domination of the union. The representatives of Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, and Vojvodina voted for

4425-460: The same rights. However, most of the German minority of Yugoslavia, most of whom had collaborated during the occupation and had been recruited to German forces, were expelled towards Germany or Austria. The country distanced itself from the Soviets in 1948 (cf. Cominform and Informbiro ) and started to build its own way to socialism under the political leadership of Josip Broz Tito. Accordingly,

4500-484: The same time, Western economies went into recession, decreasing demand for Yugoslav imports thereby creating a large debt problem. In 1989, 248 firms were declared bankrupt or were liquidated and 89,400 workers were laid off according to official sources . During the first nine months of 1990 and directly following the adoption of the IMF programme, another 889 enterprises with a combined work-force of 525,000 workers suffered

4575-569: The six republics and the two autonomous provinces), they sometimes even entered into coalitions with other republics, thus outvoting Serbia. Serbia's political impotence made it possible for others to exert pressure on the 2 million Serbs (20% of the total Serbian population) living outside Serbia. After Tito's death, Serbian communist leader Slobodan Milošević began making his way toward the pinnacle of Serbian leadership. Milošević sought to restore pre-1974 Serbian sovereignty. Other republics, especially Slovenia and Croatia, denounced his proposal as

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4650-579: The southern Austrian provinces of Styria and Carinthia . However, the Partisans withdrew from Trieste in June of the same year under heavy pressure from Stalin, who did not want a confrontation with the other Allies. Western attempts to reunite the Partisans, who denied the supremacy of the old government of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia , and the émigrés loyal to the king led to the Tito-Šubašić Agreement in June 1944; however, Marshal Josip Broz Tito

4725-442: The status of a constituent nation. The war broke out when the new regimes tried to replace Yugoslav civilian and military forces with secessionist forces. When, in August 1990, Croatia attempted to replace police in the Serb-populated Croat Krajina by force, the population first looked for refuge in the Yugoslav Army barracks, while the army remained passive. The civilians then organised armed resistance. These armed conflicts between

4800-424: The status of a republic in the 1981 protests in Kosovo while Serbian authorities suppressed this sentiment and proceeded to reduce the province's autonomy. In 1986, the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts drafted a memorandum addressing some burning issues concerning the position of Serbs as the most numerous people in Yugoslavia. The largest Yugoslav republic in territory and population, Serbia's influence over

4875-497: The status of sole legal successor to the SFRY, but those claims were opposed by the other former republics. Eventually, it accepted the opinion of the Badinter Arbitration Committee about shared succession and in 2003 its official name was changed to Serbia and Montenegro. This state dissolved when Montenegro and Serbia each became independent states in 2006, with Kosovo having an ongoing dispute over its declaration of independence in 2008. The concept of Yugoslavia , as

4950-733: The treaty and launched a coup d'état when the king returned on 27 March . Army General Dušan Simović seized power, arrested the Vienna delegation, exiled Prince Paul, and ended the regency, giving 17-year-old King Peter full powers. Hitler then decided to attack Yugoslavia on 6 April 1941, followed immediately by an invasion of Greece where Mussolini had previously been repelled. At 5:12 a.m. on 6 April 1941, German , Italian and Hungarian forces invaded Yugoslavia . The German Air Force ( Luftwaffe ) bombed Belgrade and other major Yugoslav cities. On 17 April, representatives of Yugoslavia's various regions signed an armistice with Germany in Belgrade, ending eleven days of resistance against

5025-406: The victories against the occupying forces were the battles of Neretva and Sutjeska . On 25 November 1942, the Anti-Fascist Council of National Liberation of Yugoslavia was convened in Bihać , modern day Bosnia and Herzegovina . The council reconvened on 29 November 1943, in Jajce , also in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and established the basis for post-war organisation of the country, establishing

5100-593: The worldwide protests of 1968 . President Josip Broz Tito gradually stopped the protests by giving in to some of the students' demands and saying that "students are right" during a televised speech. However, in the following years, he dealt with the leaders of the protests by sacking them from university and Communist party posts. A more severe sign of disobedience was so-called Croatian Spring of 1970 and 1971, when students in Zagreb organised demonstrations for greater civil liberties and greater Croatian autonomy, followed by mass protests across Croatia. The regime stifled

5175-446: Was assassinated in Marseille during an official visit to France in 1934 by Vlado Chernozemski , an experienced marksman from Ivan Mihailov 's Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization with the cooperation of the Ustaše , a Croatian fascist revolutionary organisation. Alexander was succeeded by his eleven-year-old son Peter II and a regency council headed by his cousin, Prince Paul . The international political scene in

5250-495: Was elected in November 1945, the monarchy was abolished, and the country was renamed the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia. It acquired the territories of Istria , Rijeka , and Zadar from Italy . Partisan leader Josip Broz Tito ruled the country from 1944 as prime minister and later as president until his death in 1980. In 1963, the country was renamed for the final time, as the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). The six constituent republics that made up

5325-419: Was in control and was determined to lead an independent communist state, starting as a prime minister. He had the support of Moscow and London and led by far the strongest Partisan force with 800,000 men. The official Yugoslav post-war estimate of victims in Yugoslavia during World War II is 1,704,000. Subsequent data gathering in the 1980s by historians Vladimir Žerjavić and Bogoljub Kočović showed that

5400-658: Was less centralized than in other socialist countries, may have led to the stronger growth. However, even if the absolute value of the growth rates was not as high as indicated by the official statistics, both the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia were characterized by surprisingly high growth rates of both income and education during the 1950s. The period of European growth ended after the oil price shock in 1970s. Following that, an economic crisis erupted in Yugoslavia due to disastrous economic policies such as borrowing vast amounts of Western capital to fund growth through exports. At

5475-481: Was now in full control, and all opposition elements were eliminated. On 31 January 1946, the new constitution of the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia , modelled after the Constitution of the Soviet Union , established six republics , an autonomous province, and an autonomous district that were a part of Serbia. The federal capital was Belgrade. The policy focused on a strong central government under

5550-412: Was retained under Tito's rule, though nationalist protests did occur, but these were usually repressed and nationalist leaders were arrested and some were executed by Yugoslav officials. However, the Croatian Spring protests in the 1970s were backed by large numbers of Croats who complained that Yugoslavia remained a Serb hegemony. Tito, whose home republic was Croatia, was concerned over the stability of

5625-520: Was to remain part of Yugoslavia, but it was hurriedly building an independent political identity in international relations. Prince Paul submitted to fascist pressure and signed the Tripartite Pact in Vienna on 25 March 1941, hoping to continue keeping Yugoslavia out of the war. However, this was at the expense of popular support for Paul's regency. Senior military officers were also opposed to

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