Croatia Quick Facts

Population:  4.4 million

Location:  South Central Europe.  Eastward directly across the Adriactic Sea from Italy.

Religion:   Roman Catholic 87.8%, Orthodox 4.4%, Muslim, 1.3%, Protestant 0.3%.

People Groups:  Croat 89.6%, Serb 4.5%, Bosniak 0.5%, Hungarian 0.4%.

Language:  Croatian (a slavic language)

Government:  Democratic government with a unicarmal parliment.  The President is Stjepan Mesic.  The  Prime Minister is Ivo Sanader.

Currency:   Kuna, which trades  roughly 6 Kuna to 1 USD.

Economy:  Tourism is Croatia's largest industry.  High unemployment plagues many areas and the national average is 18.9% (much higher in some regions and much lower in others).

Historical Background:  Croatia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until the end of World War 1.  The Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes formed a kingdom in 1918 which later became know as Yugoslavia.  In World War 2 Croatia was an axis power.  The country became communist after World War 2 due to the sucessful military campaigns of Marshall Tito and his partisans.  With the fall of communism Croatia declared its independence from Yugoslavia in 1991, but a bitter war with Serbia ensued.  Under UN supervision, the last Serb-held enclave in eastern Slavonia was returned to Croatia in 1998.

This information was compiled using information from the Croatian Bureau of Statistics and the CIA Factbook.