The Balkans, also known as the Balkan Peninsula,
is a geographic area in southeastern Europe
with various definitions and meanings, including
geopolitical and historical. The region takes
its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch
throughout the whole of Bulgaria from the
Serbian-Bulgarian border to the Black Sea
coast. The Balkan Peninsula is bordered by
the Adriatic Sea on the northwest, the Ionian
Sea on the southwest, the Aegean Sea in the
south and southeast, and the Black Sea on
the east and northeast. The northern border
of the peninsula is variously defined. The
highest point of the Balkans is Mount Musala,
2,925 metres (9,596 ft), in the Rila mountain
range.
The concept of the Balkan peninsula was created
by the German geographer August Zeune in 1808,
who mistakenly considered the Balkan Mountains
the dominant mountain system of Southeast
Europe spanning from the Adriatic Sea to the
Black Sea. The term of Balkan Peninsula was
a synonym for European Turkey in the 19th
century, the former provinces of the Ottoman
Empire in Southeast Europe. It had a geopolitical
rather than a geographical definition, further
promoted during the creation of the Kingdom
of Yugoslavia in the early 20th century. The
definition of the Balkan peninsula natural
borders are not coinciding with the technical
definition of a peninsula and hence modern
geographers are rejecting the idea of a Balkan
peninsula, while the scholars usually discuss
the Balkans as a region. The term steadily
got, especially since the 1990s, a stigmatized
and pejorative meaning related to the process
of Balkanization, and hence the rather used
alternative term for the region is Southeast
Europe.
== Name ==
=== Etymology ===
The word Balkan comes from Ottoman Turkish
balkan 'chain of wooded mountains'; related
words are also found in other Turkic languages.
The origin of the Turkic word is obscure;
it may be related to Persian bālk 'mud',
and the Turkish suffix an 'swampy forest'
or Persian balā-khāna 'big high house'.
=== Historical names and meaning ===
==== 
Classical antiquity and the early Middle Ages
====
From classical antiquity through the Middle
Ages, the Balkan Mountains were called by
the local Thracian name Haemus. According
to Greek mythology, the Thracian king Haemus
was turned into a mountain by Zeus as a punishment
and the mountain has remained with his name.
A reverse name scheme has also been suggested.
D. Dechev considers that Haemus (Αἷμος)
is derived from a Thracian word *saimon, 'mountain
ridge'. A third possibility is that "Haemus"
(Αἵμος) derives from the Greek word
"haema" (αἷμα) meaning 'blood'. The myth
relates to a fight between Zeus and the monster/titan
Typhon. Zeus injured Typhon with a thunder
bolt and Typhon's blood fell on the mountains,
from which they got their name.
==== Late Middle Ages and Ottoman period ====
The earliest mention of the name appears in
an early 14th-century Arab map, in which the
Haemus mountains are referred to as Balkan.
The first attested time the name "Balkan"
was used in the West for the mountain range
in Bulgaria was in a letter sent in 1490 to
Pope Innocent VIII by Buonaccorsi Callimaco,
an Italian humanist, writer and diplomat.
The Ottomans first mention it in a document
dated from 1565. There has been no other documented
usage of the word to refer to the region before
that, although other Turkic tribes had already
settled in or were passing through the Peninsula.
There is also a claim about an earlier Bulgar
Turkic origin of the word popular in Bulgaria,
however it is only an unscholarly assertion.
The word was used by the Ottomans in Rumelia
in its general meaning of mountain, as in
Kod̲j̲a-Balkan, Čatal-Balkan, and Ungurus-Balkani̊,
but especially it was applied to the Haemus
mountain. The name is still preserved in Central
Asia with the Balkan Daglary (Balkan Mountains)
and the Balkan Province of Turkmenistan. English
traveler John Morritt introduced this term
into the English literature at the end of
the 18th-century, and other authors started
applying the name to the wider area between
the Adriatic and the Black Sea. The concept
of the "Balkans" was created by the German
geographer August Zeune in 1808, who mistakenly
considered it as the dominant central mountain
system of Southeast Europe spanning from the
Adriatic Sea to the Black Sea. During the
1820s, "Balkan became the preferred although
not yet exclusive term alongside Haemus among
British travelers... Among Russian travelers
not so burdened by classical toponymy, Balkan
was the preferred term".
=== Evolution of meaning in 19th and 20th
century ===
The term was not commonly used in geographical
literature until the mid-19th century because
already then scientists like Carl Ritter warned
that only the part South of the Balkan Mountains
can be considered as a peninsula and considered
it to be renamed as "Greek peninsula". Other
prominent geographers who didn't agree with
Zeune were Hermann Wagner, Theobald Fischer,
Marion Newbigin, Albrecht Penck, while Austrian
diplomat Johann Georg von Hahn in 1869 for
the same territory used the term Südostereuropäische
Halbinsel ("Southeasterneuropean peninsula").
Another reason it was not commonly accepted
as the definition of then European Turkey
had a similar land extent. However, after
the Congress of Berlin (1878) there was a
political need for a new term and gradually
the Balkans was revitalized, but in the maps
the northern border was in Serbia and Montenegro
without Greece (it only depicted the Ottoman
occupied parts of Europe), while Yugoslavian
maps also included Croatia and Bosnia. The
term Balkan Peninsula was a synonym for European
Turkey, the political borders of former Ottoman
Empire provinces.The usage of the term changed
in the very end of the 19th and beginning
of the 20th century when was embraced by Serbian
geographers, most prominently by Jovan Cvijić.
It was done with political reasoning as affirmation
for Serbian nationalism on the whole territory
of the South Slavs, and also included anthropological
and ethnological studies of the South Slavs
through which were claimed various nationalistic
and racistic theories. Through such policies
and Yugoslavian maps the term was elevated
to the modern status of a geographical region.
The term acquired political nationalistic
connotations far from its initial geographic
meaning, arising from political changes from
the late 19th century to the creation of post–World
War I Yugoslavia (initially the Kingdom of
Serbs, Croats and Slovenes in 1918). After
the dissolution of Yugoslavia beginning in
June 1991, the term "Balkans" acquired a negative
political meaning, especially in Croatia and
Slovenia, as well in worldwide casual usage
for war conflicts and fragmentation of a territory
(see Balkanization).
=== Southeast Europe ===
In part due to the historical and political
connotations of the term "Balkans", especially
since the military conflicts of the 1990s
in Yugoslavia in the western half of the Balkans,
the term "Southeast Europe" is becoming increasingly
popular. A European Union initiative of 1999
is called the Stability Pact for South Eastern
Europe, and the online newspaper Balkan Times
renamed itself Southeast European Times in
2003.
=== Current ===
In the languages of the region, the peninsula
is known as:
Slavic languages:
Bulgarian: Балкански полуостров,
transliterated: Balkanski poluostrov
Macedonian: Балкански Полуостров,
transliterated: Balkanski Poluostrov
Serbo-Croatian: Balkansko poluostrvo, Балканско
полуострво; Balkanski poluotok,
Балкански полуоток
Slovene: Balkanski polotok
Romance languages:
Romanian: Peninsula Balcanică
Turkic Languages:
Turkish: Balkan Yarımadası or Balkanlar
Other languages:
Albanian: Gadishulli Ballkanik and Siujdhesa
e Ballkanit
Greek: Βαλκανική χερσόνησος,
transliterated: Valkaniki chersonisos
== 
Definitions and boundaries ==
=== 
Balkan Peninsula ===
The Balkan Peninsula is bounded by the Adriatic
Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea (including
the Ionian and Aegean seas) and the Marmara
Sea to the south and the Black Sea to the
east. Its northern boundary is often given
as the Danube, Sava and Kupa Rivers. The Balkan
Peninsula has a combined area of about 470,000
km2 (181,000 sq mi) (slightly smaller than
Spain). It is more or less identical to the
region known as Southeastern Europe.From 1920
until World War II, Italy included Istria
and some Dalmatian areas (like Zara, today's
Zadar) that are within the general definition
of the Balkan peninsula. The current territory
of Italy includes only the small area around
Trieste inside the Balkan Peninsula. However,
the regions of Trieste and Istria are not
usually considered part of the Balkans by
Italian geographers, due to their definition
of the Balkans that limits its western border
to the Kupa River.Share of total area (and
land area in brackets) within the Balkan Peninsula
by country by the Danube-Sava definition,
with Bulgaria and Greece occupying almost
the half of the territory of the Balkan Peninsula:
Entirely within the Balkan peninsula:
Albania: 28,749 km2 (100% of total land)
Bosnia and Herzegovina: 51,180 km2 (100%)
Bulgaria : 110,993.6 km2 (100%) (108,596 km2
(100%))
Kosovo*: 10,908 km2 (100%)
Montenegro: 13,810 km2 (100%)
North Macedonia: 25,710 km2 (100%)Mostly or
partially within the Balkan peninsula:
Croatia (southern mainland): 24,013 km2 (46%)
Greece (mainland): 110,496 km2 (83%) (103,410
km2 (80%))
Italy (Trieste and Monfalcone): 200 km2 (0.1%)
Romania (mainland Dobruja): 11,000 km2 (5%)
Serbia (Central Serbia) 51,000 km2 (65%)
Slovenia (southwestern part): 5,000 km2 (25%)
Turkey (European part): 22,764 km2 (3%)
=== Balkans ===
The term "the Balkans" is used more generally
for the region; it includes states in the
region, which may extend beyond the peninsula,
and is not defined by the geography of the
peninsula itself.
The Balkans are usually said to comprise Albania,
Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia,
Kosovo,, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania,
Serbia, Greece, and Slovenia. Its total area
is usually given as 666,700 square km (257,400
square miles) and the population as 59,297,000
(est. 2002).Italy, although having a small
part of its territory in the Balkan peninsula,
is not included in the term "the Balkans".
The term Southeastern Europe is also used
for the region, with various definitions.
Individual Balkan states are also considered
to be part of other regions, including Southern
Europe and Eastern Europe. Croatia, Romania,
Serbia and Slovenia are also sometimes considered
part of Central Europe. Turkey, often including
its European territory, is also included in
Western or Southwestern Asia.
=== Western Balkans ===
Western Balkans is a political neologism coined
to refer to Albania and the territory of the
former Yugoslavia less Slovenia since the
early 1990s. The region of the Western Balkan,
a coinage exclusively used in Pan-European
parlance, roughly corresponds to the Dinaric
Alps territory.
The institutions of the European Union have
generally used the term "Western Balkans"
to mean the Balkan area that includes countries
that are not members of the European Union,
while others refer to the geographical aspects.
Each of these countries aims to be part of
the future enlargement of the European Union
and reach democracy and transmission scores
but, until then, they will be strongly connected
with the pre-EU waiting program CEFTA. Croatia,
considered part of the Western Balkans, joined
the EU in July 2013.
== Criticism of the geographical definition
==
The term is criticized for having a geopolitical,
rather than a geographical meaning and definition,
as a multiethnic and political area in the
southeastern part of Europe. The geographical
term of a peninsula defines that the water
border must be longer than land, with the
land side being the shortest in the triangle,
but that is not the case with the Balkan Peninsula.
Both Eastern and Western water cathetus from
Odessa to Cape Matapan (ca. 1230-1350 km)
and from Trieste to Cape Matapan (ca. 1270-1285
km) are shorter than land cathetus from Trieste
to Odessa (ca. 1330-1365 km). The land has
a too wide line connected to the continent
to be technically proclaimed as a peninsula
- Szczecin (920 km) and Rostock (950 km) at
the Baltic Sea are closer to Trieste than
Odessa yet it is not considered as another
European peninsula. Since the late 19th and
early 20th-century literature is not known
where is exactly the northern border between
the peninsula and the continent, with an issue,
whether the rivers are suitable for its definition.
In the studies the Balkans natural borders,
especially the northern border, are often
avoided to be addressed, considered as a "fastidious
problem" by André Blanc in Geography of the
Balkans (1965), while John Lampe and Marvin
Jackman in Balkan Economic History (1971)
noted that "modern geographers seem agreed
in rejecting the old idea of a Balkan Peninsula".
Another issue is the name because the Balkan
Mountains which are mostly located in Northern
Bulgaria are not dominating the region by
length and area like the Dinaric Alps. An
eventual Balkan peninsula can be considered
a territory South of the Balkan Mountains,
with a possible name "Greek-Albanian Peninsula",
but Greece is rarely defined as a Balkan nation
both geographically and in international relations.
The term influenced the meaning of Southeast
Europe which again is not properly defined
by geographical factors yet historical borders
of the Balkans.Croatian geographers and academics
are highly critical of inclusion of Croatia
within the broad geographical, social-political
and historical context of the Balkans, while
the neologism Western Balkans is perceived
as a humiliation of Croatia by the European
political powers. According to M. S. Altić,
the term has two different meanings, "geographical,
ultimately undefined, and cultural, extremely
negative, and recently strongly motivated
by the contemporary political context". President
of Croatia Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović in 2018
stated that avoids of using the term Western
Balkans because it doesn't imply only a geographic
area, but also negative connotations, and
instead must be perceived and called as Southeast
Europe because it is part of Europe.
== Nature and natural resources ==
Most of the area is covered by mountain ranges
running from the northwest to southeast. The
main ranges are the Balkan mountains, running
from the Black Sea coast in Bulgaria to its
border with Serbia, the Rhodope mountains
in southern Bulgaria and northern Greece,
the Dinaric Alps in Bosnia and Herzegovina,
Croatia and Montenegro, the Šar massif which
spreads from Albania to North Macedonia, and
the Pindus range, spanning from southern Albania
into central Greece and the Albanian Alps.
The highest mountain of the region is Rila
in Bulgaria, with Musala at 2925 m, Mount
Olympus in Greece, being second at 2917 m
and Vihren in Bulgaria being the third at
2914 m. The karst field or polje is a common
feature of the landscape.
On the Adriatic and Aegean coasts the climate
is Mediterranean, on the Black Sea coast the
climate is humid subtropical and oceanic,
and inland it is humid continental. In the
northern part of the peninsula and on the
mountains, winters are frosty and snowy, while
summers are hot and dry. In the southern part
winters are milder. The humid continental
climate is predominant in Bosnia and Herzegovina,
northern Croatia, Bulgaria, Kosovo, northern
Montenegro, the Republic of North Macedonia,
the interior of Albania and Serbia, while
the other, less common climates, the humid
subtropical and oceanic climates, are seen
on the Black Sea coast of Bulgaria and Balkan
Turkey (European Turkey); and the Mediterranean
climate is seen on the coast of Albania, the
coast of Croatia, Greece, southern Montenegro
and the Aegean coast of Balkan Turkey (European
Turkey).Over the centuries forests have been
cut down and replaced with bush. In the southern
part and on the coast there is evergreen vegetation.
Inland there are woods typical of Central
Europe (oak and beech, and in the mountains,
spruce, fir and pine). The tree line in the
mountains lies at the height of 1800–2300
m. The land provides habitats for numerous
endemic species, including extraordinarily
abundant insects and reptiles that serve as
food for a variety of birds of prey and rare
vultures.
The soils are generally poor, except on the
plains, where areas with natural grass, fertile
soils and warm summers provide an opportunity
for tillage. Elsewhere, land cultivation is
mostly unsuccessful because of the mountains,
hot summers and poor soils, although certain
cultures such as olive and grape flourish.
Resources of energy are scarce, except in
Kosovo, where considerable coal, lead, zinc,
chromium and silver deposits are located.
Other deposits of coal, especially in Bulgaria,
Serbia and Bosnia, also exist. Lignite deposits
are widespread in Greece. Petroleum scarce
reserves exist in Greece, Serbia and Albania.
Natural gas deposits are scarce. Hydropower
is in wide use, from over 1,000 dams. The
often relentless bora wind is also being harnessed
for power generation.
Metal ores are more usual than other raw materials.
Iron ore is rare, but in some countries there
is a considerable amount of copper, zinc,
tin, chromite, manganese, magnesite and bauxite.
Some metals are exported.
== History and geopolitical significance ==
=== 
Antiquity ===
The Balkan region was the first area in Europe
to experience the arrival of farming cultures
in the Neolithic era. The Balkans have been
inhabited since the Paleolithic and are the
route by which farming from the Middle East
spread to Europe during the Neolithic (7th
millennium BC). The practices of growing grain
and raising livestock arrived in the Balkans
from the Fertile Crescent by way of Anatolia
and spread west and north into Central Europe,
particularly through Pannonia. Two early culture-complexes
have developed in the region, Starčevo culture
and Vinča culture. The Balkans are also the
location of the first advanced civilizations.
Vinča culture developed a form of proto-writing
before the Sumerians and Minoans, known as
the Old European script, while the bulk of
the symbols had been created in the period
between 4500 and 4000 BC, with the ones on
the Tărtăria clay tablets even dating back
to around 5300 BC.The identity of the Balkans
is dominated by its geographical position;
historically the area was known as a crossroads
of cultures. It has been a juncture between
the Latin and Greek bodies of the Roman Empire,
the destination of a massive influx of pagan
Bulgars and Slavs, an area where Orthodox
and Catholic Christianity met, as well as
the meeting point between Islam and Christianity.
In pre-classical and classical antiquity,
this region was home to Greeks, Illyrians,
Paeonians, Thracians, Dacians, and other ancient
groups. The Achaemenid Persian Empire incorporated
parts of the Balkans comprising Macedonia,
Thrace, Bulgaria, and the Black Sea coastal
region of Romania between the late 6th and
the first half of the 5th-century BC into
its territories. Later the Roman Empire conquered
most of the region and spread Roman culture
and the Latin language, but significant parts
still remained under classical Greek influence.
The Romans considered the Rhodope Mountains
to be the northern limit of the Peninsula
of Haemus and the same limit applied approximately
to the border between Greek and Latin use
in the region (later called the Jireček Line).
However large spaces south of Jireček Line
were and are inhabited by Vlachs (Aromanians),
the Romance-speaking heirs of Roman Empire.
The Bulgars and Slavs arrived in the 6th-century
and began assimilating and displacing already-assimilated
(through Romanization and Hellenization) older
inhabitants of the northern and central Balkans,
forming the Bulgarian Empire. During the Middle
Ages, the Balkans became the stage for a series
of wars between the Byzantine Roman and the
Bulgarian Empires.
=== Early modern period ===
By the end of the 16th-century, the Ottoman
Empire had become the controlling force in
the region after expanding from Anatolia through
Thrace to the Balkans. Many people in the
Balkans place their greatest folk heroes in
the era of either the onslaught or the retreat
of the Ottoman Empire. As examples, for Greeks,
Constantine XI Palaiologos and Kolokotronis;
and for Serbs, Miloš Obilić and Tzar Lazar;
for Montenegrins, Đurađ I Balšić and Ivan
Crnojević; for Albanians, George Kastrioti
Skanderbeg; for ethnic Macedonians, Nikola
Karev and Goce Delčev; for Bulgarians, Vasil
Levski, Georgi Sava Rakovski and Hristo Botev
and for Croats, Nikola Šubić Zrinjski.
In the past several centuries, because of
the frequent Ottoman wars in Europe fought
in and around the Balkans and the comparative
Ottoman isolation from the mainstream of economic
advance (reflecting the shift of Europe's
commercial and political centre of gravity
towards the Atlantic), the Balkans has been
the least developed part of Europe. According
to Halil İnalcık, "The population of the
Balkans, according to one estimate, fell from
a high of 8 million in the late 16th-century
to only 3 million by the mid-eighteenth. This
estimate is based on Ottoman documentary evidence."Most
of the Balkan nation-states emerged during
the 19th and early 20th centuries as they
gained independence from the Ottoman Empire
or the Austro-Hungarian empire: Greece in
1821, Serbia, Montenegro in 1878, Romania
in 1881, Bulgaria in 1908 and Albania in 1912.
=== Recent history ===
==== 
World Wars ====
In 1912–1913 the First Balkan War broke
out when the nation-states of Bulgaria, Serbia,
Greece and Montenegro united in an alliance
against the Ottoman Empire. As a result of
the war, almost all remaining European territories
of the Ottoman Empire were captured and partitioned
among the allies. Ensuing events also led
to the creation of an independent Albanian
state. Bulgaria insisted on its status quo
territorial integrity, divided and shared
by the Great Powers next to the Russo-Turkish
War (1877–78) in other boundaries and on
the pre-war Bulgarian-Serbian agreement. Bulgaria
was provoked by the backstage deals between
its former allies, Serbia and Greece, on the
allocation of the spoils at the end of the
First Balkan War. At the time, Bulgaria was
fighting at the main Thracian Front. Bulgaria
marks the beginning of Second Balkan War when
it attacked them. The Serbs and the Greeks
repulsed single attacks, but when the Greek
army invaded Bulgaria together with an unprovoked
Romanian intervention in the back, Bulgaria
collapsed. The Ottoman Empire used the opportunity
to recapture Eastern Thrace, establishing
its new western borders that still stand today
as part of modern Turkey.
The First World War was sparked in the Balkans
in 1914 when members of Young Bosnia, a revolutionary
organization with predominantly Serb and pro-Yugoslav
members, assassinated the Austro-Hungarian
heir Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in
Bosnia and Herzegovina's capital, Sarajevo.
That caused a war between Austria-Hungary
and Serbia, which—through the existing chains
of alliances—led to the First World War.
The Ottoman Empire soon joined the Central
Powers becoming one of the three empires participating
in that alliance. The next year Bulgaria joined
the Central Powers attacking Serbia, which
was successfully fighting Austro-Hungary to
the north for a year. That led to Serbia's
defeat and the intervention of the Entente
in the Balkans which sent an expeditionary
force to establish a new front, the third
one of that war, which soon also became static.
The participation of Greece in the war three
years later, in 1918, on the part of the Entente
finally altered the balance between the opponents
leading to the collapse of the common German-Bulgarian
front there, which caused the exit of Bulgaria
from the war, and in turn the collapse of
the Austro-Hungarian Empire, ending the First
World War.With the start of the Second World
War, all Balkan countries, with the exception
of Greece, were allies of Nazi Germany, having
bilateral military agreements or being part
of the Axis Pact. Fascist Italy expanded the
war in the Balkans by using its protectorate
Albania to invade Greece. After repelling
the attack, the Greeks counterattacked, invading
Italy-held Albania and causing Nazi Germany's
intervention in the Balkans to help its ally.
Days before the German invasion, a successful
coup d'état in Belgrade by neutral military
personnel seized power.Although the new government
reaffirmed Serbia's intentions to fulfill
its obligations as a member of the Axis, Germany,
with Bulgaria, invaded both Greece and Yugoslavia.
Yugoslavia immediately disintegrated when
those loyal to the Serbian King and the Croatian
units mutinied. Greece resisted, but, after
two months of fighting, collapsed and was
occupied. The two countries were partitioned
between the three Axis allies, Bulgaria, Germany
and Italy, and the Independent State of Croatia,
a puppet state of Italy and Germany.
During the occupation the population suffered
considerable hardship due to repression and
starvation, to which the population reacted
by creating a mass resistance movement. Together
with the early and extremely heavy winter
of that year (which caused hundreds of thousands
deaths among the poorly fed population), the
German invasion had disastrous effects in
the timetable of the planned invasion in Russia
causing a significant delay, which had major
consequences during the course of the war.Finally,
at the end of 1944, the Soviets entered Romania
and Bulgaria forcing the Germans out of the
Balkans. They left behind a region largely
ruined as a result of wartime exploitation.
==== Cold War ====
During the Cold War, most of the countries
on the Balkans were governed by communist
governments. Greece became the first battleground
of the emerging Cold War. The Truman Doctrine
was the US response to the civil war, which
raged from 1944 to 1949. This civil war, unleashed
by the Communist Party of Greece, backed by
communist volunteers from neighboring countries
(Albania, Bulgaria and Yugoslavia), led to
massive American assistance for the non-communist
Greek government. With this backing, Greece
managed to defeat the partisans and, ultimately,
remained the only non-communist country in
the region.
However, despite being under communist governments,
Yugoslavia (1948) and Albania (1961) fell
out with the Soviet Union. Yugoslavia, led
by Marshal Josip Broz Tito (1892–1980),
first propped up then rejected the idea of
merging with Bulgaria and instead sought closer
relations with the West, later even spearheaded,
together with India and Egypt the Non-Aligned
Movement. Albania on the other hand gravitated
toward Communist China, later adopting an
isolationist position.
As the only non-communist countries, Greece
and Turkey were (and still are) part of NATO
composing the southeastern wing of the alliance.
==== Post–Cold War ====
In the 1990s, the transition of the regions'
ex-Soviet bloc countries towards democratic
free-market societies went peacefully with
the exception of Yugoslavia. Wars between
the former Yugoslav republics broke out after
Slovenia and Croatia held free elections and
their people voted for independence on their
respective countries' referenda. Serbia in
turn declared the dissolution of the union
as unconstitutional and the Yugoslavian army
unsuccessfully tried to maintain status quo.
Slovenia and Croatia declared independence
on 25 June 1991, followed by the Ten-Day War
in Slovenia. Till October 1991, the Army withdrew
from Slovenia, and in Croatia, the Croatian
War of Independence would continue until 1995.
In the ensuing 10 years armed confrontation,
gradually all the other Republics declared
independence, with Bosnia being the most affected
by the fighting. The long lasting wars resulted
in a United Nations intervention and NATO
ground and air forces took action against
Serb forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina and
Serbia.
From the dissolution of Yugoslavia six republics
achieved international recognition as sovereign
republics, but these are traditionally included
in Balkans: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and
Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Montenegro and
Serbia. In 2008, while under UN administration,
Kosovo declared independence (according to
the official Serbian policy, Kosovo is still
an internal autonomous region). In July 2010,
the International Court of Justice, ruled
that the declaration of independence was legal.
Most UN member states recognise Kosovo. After
the end of the wars a revolution broke in
Serbia and Slobodan Milošević, the Serbian
communist leader (elected president between
1989 and 2000), was overthrown and handed
for trial to the International Criminal Tribunal
for crimes against the International Humanitarian
Law during the Yugoslav wars. Milošević
died of a heart attack in 2006 before a verdict
could have been released. Ιn 2001 an Albanian
uprising in North Macedonia forced the country
to give local autonomy to the ethnic Albanians
in the areas where they predominate.
With the dissolution of Yugoslavia an issue
emerged over the name under which the former
(federated) republic of Macedonia would internationally
be recognized, between the new country and
Greece. Being the Macedonian part of Yugoslavia
(see Vardar Macedonia), the federated Republic
under the Yugoslav identity had the name Republic
of Macedonia on which it declared its sovereignty
in 1991. Greece, having a large region (see
Macedonia) also under the same name opposed
to the usage of this name as an indication
of a nationality. The issue was resolved under
UN mediation and the Prespa agreement was
reached, which saw the country's renaming
into North Macedonia.
Balkan countries control the direct land routes
between Western Europe and South West Asia
(Asia Minor and the Middle East). Since 2000,
all Balkan countries are friendly towards
the EU and the USA.Greece has been a member
of the European Union since 1981 while Slovenia
is a member since 2004, Bulgaria and Romania
are members since 2007, and Croatia is a member
since 2013. In 2005, the European Union decided
to start accession negotiations with candidate
countries; Turkey, and North Macedonia were
accepted as candidates for EU membership.
In 2012, Montenegro started accession negotiations
with the EU. In 2014, Albania is an official
candidate for accession to the EU. In 2015,
Serbia was expected to start accession negotiations
with the EU, however this process has been
stalled over the recognition of Kosovo as
an independent state by existing EU member
states.Greece and Turkey have been NATO members
since 1952. In March 2004, Bulgaria, Romania
and Slovenia have become members of NATO.
As of April 2009, Albania and Croatia are
members of NATO. Montenegro joined in June
2017.All other countries have expressed a
desire to join the EU or NATO at some point
in the future.
== Politics and economy ==
Currently all of the states are republics,
but until World War II all countries were
monarchies. Most of the republics are parliamentary,
excluding Romania and Bosnia which are semi-presidential.
All the states have open market economies,
most of which are in the upper-middle income
range ($4,000 – $12,000 p.c.), except Croatia,
Romania, Greece and Slovenia that have high
income economies (over $12,000 p.c.), and
are classified with very high HDI in contrast
to the remaining states which are classified
with high HDI. The states from the former
Eastern Bloc that formerly had planned economy
system and Turkey mark gradual economic growth
each year, only the economy of Greece drops
for 2012 and meanwhile it was expected to
grow in 2013. The Gross domestic product (Purchasing
power parity) per capita is highest in Slovenia
(over $36,000), followed by Greece (over $29,000),
Croatia and Romania (over $25,000), Turkey,
Bulgaria, Montenegro, Serbia, North Macedonia
($10,000 – $15,000) and Bosnia, Albania
and Kosovo (below $10,000). The Gini coefficient,
which indicates the level of difference by
monetary welfare of the layers, is on the
second level at the highest monetary equality
in Albania, Bulgaria and Serbia, on the third
level in Greece, Montenegro and Romania, on
the fourth level in North Macedonia, on the
fifth level in Turkey, and the most unequal
by Gini coefficient is Bosnia at the eighth
level which is the penultimate level and one
of the highest in the world. The unemployment
is lowest in Romania (below 10%), followed
by Bulgaria, Turkey, Albania (10 – 15%),
Greece (15 – 20%), Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia
(20 – 30%), North Macedonia (over 30%) and
Kosovo (over 40%).
On political, social and economic criteria
the divisions are as follows:
Territories members of the European Union:
Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Romania and Slovenia
Territories currently in negotiation process
for EU membership: Montenegro, Serbia and
Turkey
Territories official candidates for EU membership:
Albania and North Macedonia
Territories with "potential candidates" status
for EU membership: Bosnia and Herzegovina
and Kosovo
On border control and trade criteria the divisions
are as follows:
Territories in the Schengen Area: Greece and
Slovenia
Territories that are legally bound to join
the Schengen Area: Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania
Territories in a customs union with the EU:
Turkey
Territories members of the Central European
Free Trade Agreement: Albania, Bosnia and
Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia
and Serbia.
On currency criteria the divisions are as
follows:
Territories members of the Eurozone: Greece
and Slovenia
Territories using the Euro without authorization
by the EU: Kosovo and Montenegro
Territories using national currencies and
are candidates for the Eurozone: Bulgaria
(lev), Croatia (kuna), Romania (leu)
Territories using national currencies: Albania
(lek), Bosnia and Herzegovina (convertible
mark), North Macedonia (denar), Serbia (dinar)
and Turkey (lira).
On military criteria the divisions are as
follows:
Member territories of NATO: Albania, Bulgaria,
Croatia, Greece, Montenegro, Romania, Slovenia
and Turkey
Member territories of the Partnership for
Peace with Individual Partnership Action Plan
and Membership Action Plan for joining NATO:
Bosnia and Herzegovina and North Macedonia
Member territories of the Partnership for
Peace: Serbia
On the recent political, social and economic
criteria there are two groups of countries:
Former communist territories: Albania, Bosnia
and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Kosovo,
Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia
and Slovenia
Territories with capitalist past: Greece and
Turkey
During the Cold War the Balkans were disputed
between the two blocks. Greece and Turkey
were members of NATO, Bulgaria and Romania
of the Warsaw Pact, while Yugoslavia was proponent
of a third way and was a founding member of
the Non-Aligned Movement. After the dissolution
of Yugoslavia, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina
kept an observer status within the organisation.
=== Regional organizations ===
See also the Black Sea regional organizations
== 
Statistics ==
== 
Demographics ==
The region is inhabited by Albanians, Aromanians,
Bulgarians, Bosniaks, Croats, Gorani, Greeks,
Macedonians, Montenegrins, Serbs, Slovenes,
Romanians, Turks, and other ethnic groups
which present minorities in certain countries
like the Romani and Ashkali.
=== Religion ===
The region is a meeting point of Orthodox
Christianity, Islam and Roman Catholic Christianity.
Eastern Orthodoxy is the majority religion
in both the Balkan peninsula and the Balkan
region. A variety of different traditions
of each faith are practiced, with each of
the Eastern Orthodox countries having its
own national church. A part of the population
in the Balkans defines itself as irreligious.
The Jewish communities of the Balkans were
some of the oldest in Europe and date back
to ancient times. These communities were Sephardi
Jews, except in Transylvania, Croatia and
Slovenia, where the Jewish communities were
mainly Ashkenazi Jews. In Bosnia and Herzegovina,
the small and close-knit Jewish community
is 90% Sephardic, and Ladino is still spoken
among the elderly. The Sephardi Jewish cemetery
in Sarajevo has tombstones of a unique shape
and inscribed in ancient Ladino. Sephardi
Jews used to have a large presence in the
city of Thessaloniki, and by 1900, some 80,000,
or more than half of the population, were
Jews. The Jewish communities in the Balkans
suffered immensely during World War II, and
the vast majority were killed during the Holocaust.
An exception were the Bulgarian Jews, most
of whom were saved by Boris III of Bulgaria,
who resisted Adolf Hitler, opposing their
deportation to Nazi concentration camps. Almost
all of the few survivors have emigrated to
the (then) newly founded state of Israel and
elsewhere. Almost no Balkan country today
has a significant Jewish minority.
=== Languages ===
The Balkan region today is a very diverse
ethno-linguistic region, being home to multiple
Slavic and Romance languages, as well as Albanian,
Greek, Turkish, and others. Romani is spoken
by a large portion of the Romanis living throughout
the Balkan countries. Throughout history many
other ethnic groups with their own languages
lived in the area, among them Thracians, Illyrians,
Romans, Celts and various Germanic tribes.
All of the aforementioned languages from the
present and from the past belong to the wider
Indo-European language family, with the exception
of the Turkic languages (e.g., Turkish and
Gagauz).
=== Urbanization ===
Most of the states in the Balkans are predominantly
urbanized, with the lowest number of urban
population as % of the total population found
in Kosovo at under 40%, Bosnia and Herzegovina
at 40% and Slovenia at 50%.
A list of largest cities:
* Only the European part of Istanbul is a
part of the Balkans. It is home to two thirds
of the city's 15,987,888 inhabitants.
== Time zones ==
The time zones in the Balkans are defined
as the following:
Territories in the time zone of UTC+01:00:
Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia,
Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia
and Slovenia
Territories in the time zone of UTC+02:00:
Bulgaria, Greece, Romania and Turkey
== 
Culture ==
Cuisine of the Balkans
Balkan music
== 
See also ==
== Notes
