Loading

Croatia

Croatia, 1991 to today. Draft, not yet reviewed

Croatia, officially the Republic of Croatia, is a country in Central and Southeastern Europe, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. Croatia declared independence from Yugoslavia in 1991, successfully fighting the War of Independence until 1995. After successfully completing negotiations from 2004 to 2013, Croatia joined the European Union as its 28th member in July 2013. Modern Croatia is a representative democracy with a prime minister, president, and unicameral parliament.

Seat of power: Zagreb

Rulers

Franjo Tuđman

Head of state, 1990–1999

Franjo Tuđman was the first president of Croatia, from 1990 until his death in 1999. As president, Tuđman introduced a new constitution and pressed for the creation of an independent Croatia. On 19 May 1991, an independence referendum was held, which was approved by 93 percent of voters.

Portrait of Franjo Tuđman: Mark Reinstein, Public domain, file

Vlatko Pavletić

President of Croatia, 1999–2000

Pavletić, the Speaker of the Croatian Parliament, automatically became acting President of Croatia when President Franjo Tuđman was declared incapacitated on 26 November 1999. He held this office until the Croatian Parliament elected Zlatko Tomčić as new speaker, and thus the new acting president, on 2 February 2000.

Stjepan Mesić

President of Croatia, 2000–2010

He served two five-year terms as president of Croatia, after being prime minister of SR Croatia in 1990 and the last president of the Presidency of Yugoslavia in 1991. Following the breakup of Yugoslavia and Croatia's independence, Mesić served as Speaker of the Croatian Parliament from 1992 to 1994, when he left HDZ.

Portrait of Stjepan Mesić: Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung, CC BY-SA 2.0, file

Zlatko Tomčić

President of Croatia, 2000–2000

Zlatko Tomčić served as Speaker of the Croatian Parliament from 2000 to 2003 and as acting President of Croatia in February 2000. He gave up the position to the newly elected president Stjepan Mesić on 19 February 2000.

Portrait of Zlatko Tomčić: © European Union 2003, European Parliament, file

Ivo Josipović

President of Croatia, 2010–2015

Ivo Josipović served as the president of Croatia from 2010 to 2015. He won the election with 60.26% of the vote in the second round of the election.

Portrait of Ivo Josipović: Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, file

Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović

President of Croatia, 2015–2020

She served as the president of Croatia from 2015 to 2020 and was the first woman to be elected to the office since the first multi-party elections in 1990 and independence from Yugoslavia in 1991. As president, she launched the Three Seas Initiative in 2015, together with Polish President Andrzej Duda.

Portrait of Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović: Spinaker Graphics / Office of the President of the Republic of Croatia, CC BY 4.0, file

Zoran Milanović

President of Croatia, 2020 to today

Zoran Milanović has served as president of Croatia since 2020, after being prime minister of Croatia from 2011 to 2016. As prime minister, he held the 2012 EU membership referendum and introduced a variety of economic reforms centered on tax codification, fiscalisation, and infrastructure development.

Portrait of Zoran Milanović: Ured predsjednika Republike Hrvatske, Public domain, file

Culture

Picture

Zagreb is the capital and largest city of Croatia, in the north of the country along the Sava River.

Image: Nick Savchenko from Kiev, Ukraine, CC BY-SA 2.0, file

Sources

Text adapted from the Wikipedia articles listed as sources, CC BY-SA 4.0.