HISTORY
Serbia
The Serbian state as known today was created in 1170 A.D. by Stefan
Nemanja, the founder of the Nemanjic dynasty. Serbia's religious
foundation came several years later when Stefan's son, canonized
as St. Sava, became the first archbishop of a newly autocephalous
Serbian Orthodox Church (1219). Thus, at this time, the Serbs
enjoyed both temporal and religious independence. After a series
of successions, Serbia fell under the rule of King Milutin who
improved Serbia's position among other European countries. Milutin
also was responsible for many of the brightest examples of Medieval
Serbian architecture. Moreover, Serbia began to expand under Milutin's
reign, seizing territory in nearby Macedonia from the Byzantines.
Under Milutin's son, Stefan Dusan (1331-55), the Nemanjic dynasty
reached its peak, ruling from the Danube to central Greece. However,
Serbian power waned after Stefan's death in 1355, and in the Battle
of Kosovo (June 15, 1389) the Serbs were catastrophically defeated
by the Turks. By 1459, the Turks exerted complete control over
all Serb lands.
For more than 3 centuries--nearly
370 years--the Serbs lived as virtual slaves of the Ottoman sultans.
As a result of this great oppression, Serbs began to migrate out
of their native and (present-day Kosovo and southern Serbia) into
other areas within the Balkan Peninsula, including what is now
Vojvodina and Croatia. When the Austrian Hapsburg armies pushed
the Ottoman Turks south of the Danube in 699, many Serbs were
"liberated", but their native land was still under Ottoman rule.
Movements for Serbian independence
began more than 100 years later with uprisings under the Serbian
patriots Karageorge (1804-13) and Milos Obrenovic (1815-17). After
the Russo-Turkish War of 1828-29, Serbia became an internationally
recognized principality under Turkish suzerainty and Russian protection,
and the state expanded steadily southward. After an insurrection
in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1875, Serbia and Montenegro went
to war against Turkey in 1876-78 in support of the Bosnian rebels.
With Russian assistance, Serbs gained more territory as well as
formal independence in 1878, though Bosnia was placed under Austrian
administration.
In 1908, Austria-Hungary directly
annexed Bosnia, inciting the Serbs to seek the aid of Montenegro,
Bulgaria, and Greece in seizing the last Ottoman-ruled lands in
Europe. In the ensuing Balkan Wars of 1912-13, Serbia obtained
northern and central Macedonia, but Austria compelled it to yield
Albanian lands that would have given it access to the sea. Serb
animosity against the Hapsburgs reached a climax on June 28, 1914,
when the Austrian archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in
Sarajevo by a Bosnian Serb, Gavrilo Princip, setting off a series
of diplomatic and military initiatives among the great powers
that culminated in World War I.
Soon after the war began, Austro-Hungarian
and Bulgarian forces occupied Serbia. Upon the collapse of Austria-Hungary
at the war's end in 1918, Vojvodina and Montenegro united with
Serbia, and former south Slav subjects of the Hapsburgs sought
the protection of the Serbian crown within a kingdom of Serbs,
Croats, and Slovenes. Serbia was the dominant partner in this
state, which in 1929 adopted the name Yugoslavia.
The kingdom soon encountered resistance
when Croatians began to resent control from Belgrade. This pressure
prompted King Alexander I to split the traditional regions into
nine administrative provinces. During World War II, Yugoslavia
was divided between the Axis powers and their allies. Royal army
soldiers, calling themselves Cetnici (Chetniks), formed a Serbian
resistance movement, but a more determined communist resistance
under the Partisans, with Soviet and Anglo-American help, liberated
all of Yugoslavia by 1944. In an effort to avoid Serbian domination
during the post-war years, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia,
and Montenegro were given separate and equal republican status
within the new socialist federation of Yugoslavia; Kosovo and
Vojvodina were made autonomous provinces within Yugoslavia.
Despite the attempts at a federal system of government for Yugoslavia, Serbian communists played the leading role in Yugoslavia's political life for the next 4 decades. As the Germans were defeated at the end of World War II, Josip Broz Tito, a former Bolshevik and committed communist, began to garner support from both within Yugoslavia as well as from the Allies. Yugoslavia remained independent of the U.S.S.R., as Tito broke with Stalin and asserted Yugoslav independence. Tito went on to control Yugoslavia for 35 years. Under communist rule, Serbia was transformed from an agrarian to an industrial society. In the 1980s, however, Yugoslavia's economy began to fail. With the death of Tito in 1980, separatist and nationalist tensions emerged in Yugoslavia.
In the late 1980s, Slobodan Milosevic propelled himself to power in Belgrade by exploiting the fears of the small Serbian minority in Kosovo. In 1989, he arranged the elimination of Kosovo's autonomy in favor of more direct rule from Belgrade. Belgrade ordered the firing of large numbers of Albanian state employees, whose jobs were then taken by Serbs.
As a result of this oppression, Kosovo Albanian leaders led a peaceful resistance movement in the early 1990s and established a parallel government funded mainly by the Albanian diaspora.
Between 1991 and 1992, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Macedonia all seceded from Yugoslavia. On April 27, 1992 in Belgrade, Serbia and Montenegro joined in passing the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
When Kosovo's peaceful resistance movement failed to yield results, an armed resistance emerged in 1997 in the form of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). The KLA's main goal was to secure the independence of Kosovo.
In late 1998, Milosevic unleashed a brutal police and military campaign against the separatist KLA, which included atrocities against civilian noncombatants. For the duration of Milosevic's campaign, large numbers of ethnic Albanians were either displaced from their homes in Kosovo or killed by Serbian troops or police. These acts, and Serbia's refusal to sign the Rambouillet Accords, provoked a military response from NATO, which consisted primarily of aerial bombing. The campaign continued from March through June 1999. After 79 days of bombing, Milosevic capitulated and international forces, led by NATO, moved into Kosovo. The international security presence, which is known as Kosovo Force (KFOR), works closely with the UN Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) to ensure protection for all of Kosovo's communities.
In March 2002, the Belgrade Agreement was signed by the heads of the federal and republican governments, setting forth the parameters for a redefinition of Montenegro's relationship with Serbia within a joint state. On February 4, 2003, the F.R.Y. parliament ratified the Constitutional Charter, establishing a new state union and changing the name of the country from Yugoslavia to Serbia and Montenegro.
On May 21, 2006, the Republic of Montenegro held a successful referendum on independence and declared independence on June 3. Thereafter, the parliament of Serbia stated that the Republic of Serbia was the continuity of the state union, changing the name of the country from Serbia and Montenegro to the Republic of Serbia, with Serbia retaining Serbia and Montenegro's membership in all international organizations and bodies.
On February 17, 2008, the UN-administered province of Kosovo declared its independence. The United States officially recognized Kosovo's independence the following day.
