The lands that today comprise Croatia were
part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until the close of World War
I. In 1918, the Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes formed a kingdom
known after 1929 as Yugoslavia. Following World War II,
Yugoslavia became a federal independent Communist state under
the strong hand of Marshal TITO. Although Croatia declared its
independence from Yugoslavia in 1991, it took four years of
sporadic, but often bitter, fighting before occupying Serb
armies were mostly cleared from Croatian lands. Under UN
supervision, the last Serb-held enclave in eastern Slavonia was
returned to Croatia in 1998.
Location:
Southeastern Europe, bordering the Adriatic
Sea, between Bosnia and Herzegovina and Slovenia.
Area:
56,542 sq km
Border countries:
Bosnia and Herzegovina 932 km, Hungary 329
km, Serbia 241 km, Montenegro 25 km, Slovenia 670 km.
Climate:
Mediterranean and continental; continental
climate predominant with hot summers and cold winters; mild
winters, dry summers along coast.
Geography:
controls most land routes from Western Europe
to Aegean Sea and Turkish Straits
Population:
4,494,749
Nationality:
Croat(s), Croatian(s)
Ethnic groups:
Croat 89.6%, Serb 4.5%, other 5.9% (including
Bosniak, Hungarian, Slovene, Czech, and Roma)
Religions:
Roman Catholic 87.8%, Orthodox 4.4%, other
Christian 0.4%, Muslim 1.3%, other and unspecified 0.9%, none
5.2%
Languages:
Croatian 96.1%, Serbian 1%, other and
undesignated 2.9% (including Italian, Hungarian, Czech, Slovak,
and German)
Government type:
presidential/parliamentary democracy
Capital:
Zagreb
Time zone:
GMT/UTC +01:00
National holiday:
Independence Day, 8 October (1991); note - 25
June 1991 is the day the Croatian Parliament voted for
independence; following a three-month moratorium to allow the
European Community to solve the Yugoslav crisis peacefully,
Parliament adopted a decision on 8 October 1991 to sever
constitutional relations with Yugoslavia
Currency:
kuna (HRK)
Communications:
Telephones - main lines in use: 1,889,500
Transportation:
Airports: 68, Railways: 2,726 km, Roadways:
28,344 km, Waterways: 785 km