Hear it pronouncedRepublic of Macedonia
| Република Македонија Republika Makedonija[1] Republic of Macedonia
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| Motto: Слобода или смрт (English: "Freedom or Death")[citation needed] |
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| Anthem: Денес над Македонија (English: "Today over Macedonia") |
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 Location of the Republic of Macedonia (orange)
on the European continent (white) — [Legend] |
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| Largest city | Skopje | |||||
| Official languages | Macedonian1 | |||||
| Demonym | Macedonian | |||||
| Government | Parliamentary republic | |||||
| - | President | Branko Crvenkovski | ||||
| - | Prime Minister | Nikola Gruevski (VMRO–DPMNE) | ||||
| Independence from | Yugoslavia | |||||
| - | Independence declared Officially recognised |
September 8, 1991 8 April 1993 |
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| Area | ||||||
| - | Total | 25,713 km² (148th) 9,779 sq mi |
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| - | Water (%) | 1.9% | ||||
| Population | ||||||
| - | Jan. 01, 2006 estimate | 2,038,514[2] (143rd) | ||||
| - | 2002 census | 2,022,547 | ||||
| - | Density | 79/km² (111th) 205/sq mi |
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| GDP (PPP) | 2006 estimate | |||||
| - | Total | $16.94 billion (103rd) | ||||
| - | Per capita | $7,645 | ||||
| GDP (nominal) | 2006 estimate | |||||
| - | Total | $16,410 billion (121st) | ||||
| - | Per capita | $7,645 (80th) | ||||
| Gini (2004) | 29.3 (low) | |||||
| HDI (2005) | ▲ 0.801 (high) (69th) | |||||
| Currency | Macedonian denar (MKD) |
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| Time zone | CET (UTC+1) | |||||
| - | Summer (DST) | CEST (UTC+2) | ||||
| Internet TLD | .mk | |||||
| Calling code | +389 | |||||
| 1 | Albanian is widely spoken in Western Macedonia. In some areas Turkish, Serbian, Romany and Aromanian are also spoken. | |||||
The Republic of Macedonia (Macedonian: Република Македонија, Republika Makedonijalisten [1]), often referred to as Macedonia, is a landlocked country on the Balkan peninsula in southeastern Europe. It is bordered by Serbia (and Kosovo) to the north, Albania to the west, Greece to the south, and Bulgaria to the east.
It was admitted to the United Nations in 1993 under the provisional reference the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia[3][4] commonly abbreviated to FYROM,[5][6] pending resolution of a naming dispute with Greece.[7] Many other international institutions and countries have recognised the country under the same reference, although an overall majority of countries recognise it under its constitutional name.[8]
The Republic of Macedonia forms approximately 35.8% of the land and 40.9% of the population of the wider geographical region of Macedonia, as it was defined in the late 19th century. The capital is Skopje, with 506 926 inhabitants according to a 2004 census, and there are a number of smaller cities, notably Bitola, Kumanovo, Prilep, Tetovo, Ohrid, Veles, Štip, Kočani, Gostivar and Strumica. It has more than 50 natural and artificial lakes and sixteen mountains higher than 2,000 meters (6,550 ft).
The country is a member of the UN and the Council of Europe and a member of La Francophonie, the World Trade Organization (WTO), and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Since December 2005 it is also a candidate for joining the European Union and has applied for NATO membership.
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History
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The lands governed by the Republic of Macedonia were previously the southernmost part of the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia. Its current borders were fixed shortly after World War II when the Anti-Fascist Assembly for the National Liberation of Macedonia declared the People's Republic of Macedonia as a separate nation within Yugoslavia.
Over the centuries the territory which today forms the Republic of Macedonia was ruled by a number of different states and former empires.
Ancient History
The first recorded state on the territory of the Republic of Macedonia was the Thraco-Illyrian kingdom of Paionia, which covered the Axius River valley and the surrounding areas.[9] Philip II of Macedon took over the southernmost regions of Paeonia in 336 BC and founded the city of Heraclea Lyncestis, near what is now Bitola.[10] Philip's son Alexander the Great conquered the remainder of Paeonia, which then became part of his empire. Subsequently the territory was conquered by Rome and became part of two Roman provinces. The greater part was within Macedonia Salutaris, but the northern border regions, inhabited by the Dardani, became a part of Moesia Superior.[11] By 400 AD the Paeonians had lost their identity, and Paeonia was merely a geographic term.
The Medieval period
In the late 6th century AD, as Byzantine control over the area disintegrated, the region was increasingly settled by various Slavic tribes from the north, such as Draguvites, Bersites, Sagudates, Smoleanoi and Strymonoi. During this decay in Byzantine power, some of the pre-Slavic inhabitants retreated to fortified Greek cities along the Aegean Sea, others took refuge in mountains, whilst many others were assimilated by the Slavs. These people were a large mix of indigenous Balkaners (Greeks, Illyrians and Thracians as well as "Roman" settlers and foederati that had settled the area over the preceding centuries; sharing a sense of Graeco-Roman identity (by was of language and customs). The Slavs of Byzantine Macedonia organised themselves in autonomous rural societies called by the Greeks "Σκλαβινίαι" (Sklaviniai). The Byzantine emperors would aim to Hellenise and incorporate the Sklaviniai into the socio-economic rule of Byzantium. While Byzantine achieved this with the Slavs of the Thracian theme, the emperors had to resort to military expeditions to pacify the Sklaviniai of Macedonia, often repeatedly. These expeditions reached their peak with Justinian II, and Byzantine accounts report that as many as 200,000 from Macedonia to central Anatolia, forcing them to pay tribute and serve in the imperial army. Whilst many of the Slavs in Macedonia had to acknowledge Byzantine authority, the majority remained ethnically independent, and continued to form the demographic majority in the region as a whole. Rather than forming a unified Slavic state, they continued to live as separate tribes. Circa 850 AD, the First Bulgarian Empire expanded into the region of Macedonia. John Fine suggests that Bulgaria's expansion into Macedonia was smooth, since Byzantine authority in the area was nominal, and most of the Slavic tribes of Macedonia willingly joined (the predominantly Slavic) Bulgarian confederacy.[12]
The Slavic peoples of Macedonia accepted Christianity as their own religion around the 9th century, during the reign of prince Boris I of Bulgaria. The creators of the Glagolitic alphabet, the Byzantine Greek monks Saint Cyril and Saint Methodius, under the guidance of the Patriarchate at Constantinople, were promoters of Christianity and initiated Slavic literacy among the Slavic people. They were based in Thessaloniki, where Slavic was spoken universally as a second language after Greek, and used the Macedonian dialect spoken in the hinterland of Thessaloniki as the basis for what would become the universal Old Slavonic. Their work was accepted in early medieval Bulgaria and continued by St. Clement of Ohrid, creator of Cyrillic alphabet and St. Naum of Ohrid as founders of the Ohrid Literary School.
In 1014, Emperor Basil II finally defeated the armies of Tsar Samuil and by 1018 the Byzantines restored control over Macedonia (and all of the Balkans) for the first time since the 600s. However, by the late 12th century, inevitable Byzantine decline saw the region become contested by various political entities, including a brief Norman occupation in the 1080s. In the early 13th century, a revived Bulgarian Empire gained control of the region. Plagued by political difficulties the empire did not last and the wider geographical Macedonia region fell once again under Byzantine control. In the 14th century, it became part of the Serbian Empire, who saw themselves as liberators of their Slavic kin from Byzantine despotism. Skopje became the capital of Tsar Stefan Dusan's empire.
However, with Dusan's death, a weak successor and power struggles between nobles divided the Balkans once again. This coincided with the entry of the Ottoman Turks into Europe. With no major Balkan power left to defend Christianity, the entire Balkans fell to Turkish rule - which would remain so for five centuries.
The National Awakening
Ottoman rule over the region was considered harsh. One of the earliest uprisings against Ottoman rule came in 1689 with Karposh's Rebellion. Several movements whose goals were the establishment of autonomous Macedonia, encompassing the entire region of Macedonia, began to arise in the late 1800s; the earliest of these was the Bulgarian Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Committees, later transformed to SMORO. In 1905 it was renamed as IMORO and after World War I the organization separated into the IMRO and the ITRO. The early organization did not proclaim any ethnic identities; it was officially open to "...uniting all the disgruntled elements in Macedonia and the Adrianople region, regardless of their nationality...".[13] The majority of its members were however Slavic/Bulgarian-speakers.[13] In 1903, IMRO organised the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising against the Ottomans, which after some initial successes, including the forming of the Krushevo Republic, was crushed with much loss of life. The uprising and the forming of the Krushevo Republic are considered the cornerstone and precursors to the eventual establishment of the Republic of Macedonia.
Kingdoms of Serbia and Yugoslavia
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Republic of Macedonia |
| Chronological |
| ASNOM |
| S.R. Macedonia (1944–1991) |
| 1963 Skopje earthquake (1963) |
| Declaration of independence (1991) |
| Republic of Macedonia (since 1991) |
| Insurgency in Macedonia (2001) |
| Ohrid Agreement (2001) |
| Topical |
| Military history |
| Demographics |
| History of the Macedonian people |
| Other |
| Public Holidays |
| Naming Dispute
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| Also see terminology and history of the region of Macedonia. |
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Following the two Balkan wars of 1912 and 1913 and the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, most of its European held territories were divided between Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia. The territory of the present-day Republic of Macedonia was then named Južna Srbija, "Southern Serbia". After the First World War, Serbia became part of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. In 1929, the Kingdom was officially renamed the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and divided into provinces called banovinas. Southern Serbia (Vardar Macedonia), including all of what is now the Republic of Macedonia, became known as the Vardar Banovina of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
Yugoslav Macedonia in World War II
In 1941, Yugoslavia was occupied by the Axis Powers and the Vardar Banovina was divided between Bulgaria and Italian-occupied Albania. Local recruits and volunteers formed the Bulgarian 5th Army, based in Skopje, which was responsible for the round-up and deportation of over 7,000 Jews in Skopje and Bitola. Harsh rule by the occupying forces encouraged some to support the Communist Partisan resistance movement of Josip Broz Tito.
Macedonia in Socialist Yugoslavia
After the end of the Second World War, when Tito became Yugoslavia's president, the People's Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was established. The People's Republic of Macedonia became one of the six republics of the Yugoslav federation. Following the federation's renaming as the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1963, the People's Republic of Macedonia was likewise renamed, becoming the Socialist Republic of Macedonia. It dropped the "Socialist" from its name in 1991 when it peacefully seceded from Yugoslavia.
Declaration of independence
The country officially celebrates September 8, 1991 as Independence day (Macedonian: Ден на независноста, Den na nezavisnosta), with regard to the referendum endorsing independence from Yugoslavia, albeit legalising participation in future union of the former states of Yugoslavia. The anniversary of the start of the Ilinden-Preobrazhenie Uprising (St. Elijah's Day) on August 2 is also widely celebrated on an official level.
Robert Badinter as a head of Arbitration Commission of the Peace Conference on the former Yugoslavia recommended EU recognition in January 1992.[14]
The Republic of Macedonia remained at peace through the Yugoslav wars of the early 1990s. A few very minor changes to its border with Yugoslavia were agreed upon to resolve problems with the demarcation line between the two countries. However, it was seriously destabilised by the Kosovo War in 1999, when an estimated 360,000 ethnic Albanian refugees from Kosovo took refuge in the country. Although they departed shortly after the war, soon after, Albanian radicals on both sides of the border took up arms in pursuit of autonomy or independence for the Albanian-populated areas of the Republic.
Macedonian civil conflict
The civil war was fought between government and ethnic Albanian rebels, mostly in the north and west of the country, between March and June 2001. This war ended with the intervention of a NATO ceasefire monitoring force. In the Ohrid Agreement, the government agreed to devolve greater political power and cultural recognition to the Albanian minority. The Albanian side agreed to surrender separatist demands and to fully recognise all Macedonian institutions. In addition, according to this accord, the NLA were to disarm and hand over their weapons to a NATO force. In 2005, the country was officially recognised as a European Union candidate state, under the reference "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia".
Geography
Topography
The Republic of Macedonia is a landlocked country that is geographically clearly defined by a central valley formed by the Vardar river and framed along its borders by mountain ranges. The Republic's terrain is mostly rugged, located between the Šara and Osogovo, which frame the valley of the Vardar river. Three large lakes — Lake Ohrid, Lake Prespa and Dojran Lake — lie on the southern borders of the Republic, bisected by the frontiers with Albania and Greece. Ohrid is considered to be one of the oldest lakes and biotopes in the world.[15] The region is seismically active and has been the site of destructive earthquakes in the past, most recently in 1963 when Skopje was heavily damaged by a major earthquake, killing over 1,000.
The Republic of Macedonia also has scenic mountains. They belong to two different ranges: Dinarska and Rodopska. The Dinarska range is the oldest with subsequent erosion; the Rodopska range is younger offering rugged, alpine scenery. The ten highest mountains in the Republic of Macedonia are:
| Name | Height (m) | Height (ft) |
| Mount Korab | 2,764 | 9,396 |
| Šar Mountain | 2,747 | 9,012 |
| Baba Mountain | 2,601 | 8,533 |
| Jakupica | 2,540 | 8,333 |
| Nidže | 2,521 | 8,271 |
| Deshat | 2,373 | 7,785 |
| Galičica | 2,288 | 7,507 |
| Stogovo | 2,273 | 7,457 |
| Jablanica | 2,257 | 7,405 |
| Osogovo | 2,251 | 7,383 |
| Mount Bistra | 2,163 | 7,096 |
| Plačkovica | 1,754 | 5,754 |
Climate
The Republic of Macedonia has transitional climate from Mediterranean to continental. The summers are hot and dry and the winters are moderately cold. Average annual precipitation varies from 1,700 mm (67 inches) in the western mountainous area to 500 mm (20 inches) in the eastern area. There are three main climatic zones in the country: temperate Mediterranean, mountainous and mildly Continental. Along the valleys of the Vardar and Strumica rivers, in thee regions of Gevgelija, Valandovo, Source: this wikipedia article, under GFDL.
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