Serbia (offi cial: Republic of Serbia) is a landlocked European country situated on the Balkans peninsula. Aft er a period of a relatively strong medieval kingdom, Serbia was occupied by the Ottoman Empire in the 15th Century. In the 19th Century, Serbs fought two revolutions against the Ottomans and fi nally in 1878, the modern Serbian state was internationally recognized on the Berlin Congress. Th e period of Ottoman rule, however, left a huge mark in the country’s folklore, literature, as well as the infl uence of local governments which preserved Serbian culture during this long and dark period (Milosavljević 2005: 52). Serbia had a big role in the First World War, in which it suff ered vast casualties, aft er which the fi rst Yugoslavia was formed. During the Second World War, Serbia was occupied and the communist partisans organized a resistance movement, fi ghting the Nazis as well as collaborators, which led to an outbreak of a civil war which lasted in parallel with the Nazi terror. In 1945, the second Yugoslavia was formed as a federal socialist state and lasted up until the outbreak of a fratricidal war in the 1990s. Th e third Yugoslavia was comprised of Serbia and Montenegro and it was marked by president Milosevic’s authoritarian rule. Aft er the Milosevic’s regime was brought down in 2000, it became a democratic, parliamentarian republic. In 2006, Montenegro left the union and Serbia became an independent country. In 2008, its Southern province Kosovo unilaterally declared independence, which is still not offi cially recognized by the United Nations. Population of Serbia is 7,186,862 (excl. Kosovo), most of which are Serbs (83.3%). Th e most common religious domination is Orthodox Christianity. Nominal GDP of Serbia in 2013 was $42.648 billion (IMF, 2014), and is expected to grow in 2014 at rate of 1% (IMF, 2014). Economy of Serbia is service oriented, as services account for up to 60% of GDP. Its main industries are motor vehicles manufacturing, oil and natural gas, furniture and food processing. Infl ation in 2013 was normal (2.2%), while defi cit remained high at 4.88% of GDP as well as public debt which passed the 60% threshold (IMF 2014). One of the main problems of the Serbian economy is unemployment which is at 22%, as well as corruption, shadow economy and overbureaucratization, accounting for the country’s low ranking on the ease of doing business list (91st in the World; World Bank Group 2014). Serbia is a member state of the Council of Europe and CEFTA and an offi cial candidate for the European Union.