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300px-Yugoslav Wars Montage2

Clockwise from top left: The building of the parliament of SR Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo burns after being hit by shellfire during the Siege of Sarajevo; Signing of the Dayton Agreement; The Vukovar water tower displays the Croatian flag during the Siege of Vukovar, symbolizing the town's resistance; Column of JNA tanks in Slovenia

The Yugoslav Wars were a series of violent conflicts fought in the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia between 1991 and 1995 (with wars and ensuing infighting still continuing within the region). The wars were complex: they have been characterized by bitter ethnic conflicts among the peoples of the former Yugoslavia, mostly between Serbs (and to a lesser extent, Montenegrins) on the one side and Croats and Bosniaks (and to a lesser degree, Slovenes) on the other; but also between Bosniaks and Croats in Bosnia (in addition to a separate conflict fought between rival Bosniak factions in Bosnia). The wars ended in various stages, mostly resulting in full international recognition of new sovereign territories, but with massive economic disruption to the successor states.

Often described as Europe's deadliest conflicts since World War II, they have become infamous for the war crimes they involved, including mass ethnic cleansing. They were the first conflicts since World War II to be formally judged genocidal in character and many key individual participants were subsequently charged with war crimes. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was established by the United Nations to prosecute these crimes.

Although tensions in Yugoslavia had been mounting since the early 1980s, it was 1990 that proved the decisive year in which war became more likely. In the midst of economic hardship, the country was facing rising nationalism amongst its various ethnic groups. At the last 14th Extraordinary Congress of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia in January 1990, the Serbian-dominated assembly agreed to abolish the single-party system, however Slobodan Milošević, the head of the Serbian Party branch (League of Communists of Serbia) used his influence to block and vote-down all other proposals from the Croatian and Slovene party delegates. This prompted the Croatian and Slovene delegations to walk out and thus the break-up of the party,[4] a symbolic event representing the end of "brotherhood and unity".

The Yugoslav Wars may be considered to comprise of three separate but related wars:

   * War in Slovenia (1991)
   * Croatian War of Independence (1991–1995)
   * Bosnian War (1992–1995)
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