Independence of Croatia

The independence of Croatia was a process started with the changes in the political system and the constitutional changes in 1990 that transformed the Socialist Republic of Croatia into the Republic of Croatia, which in turn proclaimed the Christmas Constitution, and held the Croatian independence referendum, 1991.

After the country formally declared independence in June 1991, and the dissolution of its association with SFR Yugoslavia, it introduced a three-month moratorium on the decision when urged to do so by the European Community and the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. During that time the Croatian War of Independence started.

On 8 October 1991, the Croatian Parliament severed all remaining ties with Yugoslavia. The Badinter Arbitration Committee had to rule on the matter. Finally, the Croatian independence was internationally recognized in January 1992, when both the European Economic Community and the United Nations granted Croatia diplomatic recognition, and the country was accepted into the United Nations shortly thereafter.

Croatia was a Socialist federal unit of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, a one-party state run by the League of Communists of Croatia created at the end of World War II in Yugoslavia. Croatia enjoyed a degree of autonomy within the Yugoslav federation. At the turn of the 1970s, a Croatian national protest movement called the Croatian Spring was suppressed by Yugoslav leadership. Still, the 1974 Yugoslav Constitution gave increased autonomy to federal units, essentially fulfilling a goal of the Croatian Spring and providing a legal basis for independence of the federative constituents.