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The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions.
The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the whole of Bulgaria. The Balkan Peninsula is bordered by the Adriatic Sea in the northwest, the Ionian Sea in the southwest, the Aegean Sea in the south, the Turkish straits in the east, and the Black Sea in the northeast. The northern border of the peninsula is variously defined. The highest point of the Balkans is Musala, , in the Rila mountain range, Bulgaria.The concept of the Balkan Peninsula was created by the German geographer August Zeune in 1808,
who mistakenly considered the Balkan Mountains the dominant mountain system of southeastern Europe spanning from the Adriatic Sea to the Black Sea. In the 19th century the term Balkan Peninsula was a synonym for Rumelia, the parts of Europe that were provinces of the Ottoman Empire at the time. It had a geopolitical rather than a geographical definition, which was further promoted during the creation of Yugoslavia in the early 20th century. The definition of the Balkan Peninsula's natural borders does not coincide with the technical definition of a peninsula; hence modern geographers reject the idea of a Balkan Peninsula, while historical scholars usually discuss the Balkans as a region. The term has acquired a stigmatized and pejorative meaning related to the process of Balkanization. The region may alternatively be referred to as Southeast Europe.The borders of the Balkans are, due to many contrasting definitions, widely disputed, with no universal agreement on its components. By most definitions, the term fully encompasses Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia (up to the Sava and Kupa rivers), mainland Greece, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Northern Dobruja in Romania, Serbia (up to the Danube river), and East Thrace in Turkey. However, many definitions also include the remaining territories of Croatia, Romania and Serbia, as well as Slovenia (up to the Kupa river). Additionally, some definitions include Hungary and Moldova due to cultural and historical factors. The province of Trieste in northeastern Italy, whilst by some definitions on the geographical peninsula, is generally excluded from the Balkans in a regional context.
From classical antiquity through the Middle Ages, the Balkan Mountains were called by the local Thracians name Haemus.
According to Greek mythology, the Thrace king Haemus was turned into a mountain by Zeus as a punishment and the mountain has remained with his name.Ovid, Metamorphoses 6.87–89 A reverse name scheme has also been suggested. D. Dechev considers that Haemus (Αἷμος) is derived from a Thracian word *saimon, 'mountain ridge'. A third possibility is that "Haemus" (Αἵμος) derives from the Greek word haima (αἷμα) meaning 'blood'. The myth relates to a fight between Zeus and the monster/titan Typhon. Zeus injured Typhon with a thunder bolt and Typhon's blood fell on the mountains, giving them their name.
The usage of the term changed in the very end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, when it was embraced by Serbian geographers, most prominently by Jovan Cvijić. It was done with political reasoning as affirmation for Serbian nationalism on the whole territory of the South Slavs, and also included anthropological and ethnological studies of the South Slavs through which were claimed various nationalistic and racialist theories. Through such policies and Yugoslavian maps the term was elevated to the modern status of a geographical region. The term acquired political nationalistic connotations far from its initial geographic meaning, arising from political changes from the late 19th century to the creation of post–World War I Yugoslavia (initially the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes in 1918). After the dissolution of Yugoslavia beginning in June 1991, the term Balkans acquired a negative political meaning, especially in Croatia and Slovenia, as well in worldwide casual usage for war conflicts and fragmentation of territory.
Italy currently holds a small area around Trieste that is by some older definitions considered a part of the Balkan Peninsula. However, the regions of Trieste and Istria are not usually considered part of the peninsula by Italian geographers, due to their definition limiting its western border to the Kupa River.Istituto Geografico De Agostini, L'Enciclopedia Geografica – Vol. I – Italia, 2004, Ed. De Agostini p. 78
The term Southeast Europe may also be applied to the region, with various interpretations, although Balkan countries may alternatively be placed in Southern Europe, Central Europe or Eastern Europe. Turkey, including East Thrace, is generally placed in West Asia or the Middle East.
The institutions of the EU have generally used the term Western Balkans to mean the Balkan area that includes countries that are not members of the EU, while others refer to the geographical aspects. Each of these countries aims to be part of the future enlargement of the EU and reach democracy and transmission scores but, until then, they will be strongly connected with the pre-EU waiting programme Central European Free Trade Agreement. Croatia, considered part of the Western Balkans, joined the EU in July 2013.
Croatian geographers and academics are highly critical of inclusion of Croatia within the broad geographical, social-political and historical context of the Balkans, while the neologism Western Balkans is perceived as a humiliation of Croatia by the European political powers. According to M. S. Altić, the term has two different meanings, "geographical, ultimately undefined, and cultural, extremely negative, and recently strongly motivated by the contemporary political context". In 2018, President of Croatia Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović stated that the use of the term "Western Balkans" should be avoided because it does not imply only a geographic area, but also negative connotations, and instead must be perceived as and called Southeast Europe because it is part of Europe.
Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek said of the definition,
On the Adriatic Sea and Aegean Sea coasts, the climate is Mediterranean, on the Black Sea coast the climate is humid subtropical and Oceanic climate, and inland it is humid continental. In the northern part of the peninsula and on the mountains, winters are frosty and snowy, while summers are hot and dry. In the southern part, winters are milder. The humid continental climate is predominant in Bosnia and Herzegovina, northern Croatia, Bulgaria, Kosovo, northern Montenegro, the Republic of North Macedonia, and the interior of Albania and Serbia. Meanwhile, the other less common climates, the humid subtropical and oceanic climates, are seen on the Black Sea coast of Bulgaria and East Thrace. The Mediterranean climate is seen on the Adriatic coasts of Albania, Croatia and Montenegro, as well as the Ionian coasts of Albania and Greece, in addition to the Aegean coasts of Greece and East Thrace.
Over the centuries, forests have been cut down and replaced with bush. In the southern part and on the coast there is evergreen vegetation. Inland there are woods typical of Central Europe (oak and beech, and in the mountains, spruce, fir and pine). The tree line in the mountains lies at the height of 1,800–2,300 m. The land provides for numerous endemic species, including extraordinarily abundant insects and reptiles that serve as food for a variety of birds of prey and rare .
The soils are generally poor, except on the , where areas with natural grass, fertile soils and warm summers provide an opportunity for tillage. Elsewhere, land cultivation is mostly unsuccessful because of the mountains, hot summers and poor soils, although certain cultures such as olive and grape flourish.
Resources of energy are scarce, except in Kosovo, where considerable coal, lead, zinc, chromium and silver deposits are located. Other deposits of coal, especially in Bulgaria, Serbia and Bosnia, also exist. Lignite deposits are widespread in Greece. Petroleum scarce reserves exist in Greece, Serbia and Albania. Natural gas deposits are scarce. Hydropower is in wide use, from over 1,000 dams. The often relentless bora wind is also being harnessed for power generation.
Metal ores are more usual than other raw materials. Iron ore is rare, but in some countries there is a considerable amount of copper, zinc, tin, chromite, manganese, magnesite and bauxite. Some metals are exported.
The practices of growing grain and raising livestock arrived in the Balkans from the Fertile Crescent by way of Anatolia and spread west and north into Central Europe, particularly through Pannonia. Two early culture-complexes have developed in the region, Starčevo culture and Vinča culture. The Balkans are also the location of the first advanced civilizations. Vinča culture developed a form of proto-writing before the and Minoans, known as the Old European script, while the bulk of the symbols had been created in the period between 4500 and 4000 BC, with the ones on the Tărtăria clay tablets even dating back to around 5300 BC.
The identity of the Balkans is dominated by its geographical position; historically the area was known as a crossroads of cultures. It has been a juncture between the Latin and Greek language bodies of the Roman Empire, the destination of a massive influx of pagan Bulgars and Slavs, an area where Orthodox and Catholic Christianity met, as well as the meeting point between Islam and Christianity.
Albanic, Hellenic, and other Palaeo-Balkan languages, had their formative core in the Balkans after the Indo-European migrations in the region.
pp. 1, 10. In pre-classical and classical antiquity, this region was home to Greeks, Illyrians, Paeonians, Thracians, Dacians, and other ancient groups. The Achaemenid Persian Empire incorporated parts of the Balkans comprising Macedonia, Thrace (parts of present-day eastern Bulgaria), and the Black Sea coastal region of Romania beginning in 512 BC.Joseph Roisman, Ian Worthington A Companion to Ancient Macedonia pp. 135–138, 342–345 John Wiley & Sons, 2011 Following the Persian defeat in the Greco-Persian Wars in 479 BC, they abandoned all of their European territories, which regained their independence. During the reign of Philip II of Macedon (359-336 BC), Macedonia rose to become the most powerful state in the Balkans. In the second century BC, the Roman Empire conquered the region and spread Roman culture and the Latin language, but significant parts still remained under Ancient Greece influence. The only Paleo-Balkan languages that survived are Albanian and Greek language. The Roman Empire considered the Rhodope Mountains to be the northern limit of the Peninsula of Haemus and the same limit applied approximately to the border between Greek and Latin use in the region (later called the Jireček Line). However large spaces south of Jireček Line were and are inhabited by Vlachs (Aromanians), the Romance-speaking heirs of Roman Empire.Thede Kahl - "Istoria aromânilor", Editura Tritonic, București, 2006A.N. Haciu – "Aromânii. Comerț, industrie, arte, expansiune, civilizație", ediția I, 1936; ediția a II-a, Editura Cartea Armână, Constanța, 2003, 598 p.;The Bulgars and South Slavs arrived in the sixth-century and began assimilating and displacing already-assimilated (through Romanization and Hellenization) older inhabitants of the northern and central Balkans. Twenty Years of Balkan Tangle. Mary Edith Durham (2007). p. 125. This migration brought about the formation of distinct ethnic groups amongst the South Slavs, which included the Bulgarians, Croats and Serbs and Slovenes.
Prior to the Slavic landing, parts of the western peninsula have been home to the Proto-Albanians. Including cities like Nish, Shtip, and Shkup. This can be proven through the development of the names, for example Naissos > Nish and Astibos > Shtip follow Albanian phonetic sound rules and have entered Slavic, indicating that Proto-Albanian was spoken in those cities prior to the Slavic invasion of the Balkans.Geniş & Maynard 2009, p. 557Katičić, Radoslav (1976). Ancient Languages of the Balkans. Mouton. p. 186. ISBN 9789027933157. "On the other hand Niš from Ναϊσσός, Štip from Ἄστιβος, Šar from Scardus, and Ohrid from Lychnidus presuppose the sound development characteristic for Albanian".Curtis, Matthew Cowan (2012). Slavic-Albanian Language Contact, Convergence, and Coexistence (Thesis). The Ohio State University. p. 42. Proto-Albanian speakers were Christianized under the Latin sphere of influence, specifically in the 4th century CE, as shown by the basic Christianity terms in Albanian, which are of Latin origin and entered Proto-Albanian before the Gheg Albanian–Tosk Albanian dialectal diversification.
The emergence of the First Bulgarian Empire and the constant conflicts between the Byzantine Empire and the First Bulgarian Empire significantly weakened the Byzantine control over the Balkans by the end of the 10th century. The Byzantines further lost power in the Balkans after the resurgence of the Bulgarians in the late 12th century, with the forming of their Second Bulgarian Empire. After the collapse of the Second Bulgarian Empire, the Byzantine's Empire grip on power was prolonged by the inability of the Slavs to unite, which was caused by frequent infighting amongst themselves. Bulgaria in the first half of the 14th century was then overshadowed by the new rising regional power of Serbia, which was a result of Stefan Dušan rising up and conquering much of the Balkans to create the Serbian Empire. The Serbian and Byzantine empires continued to be the dominant forces in the region until the arrival of the Ottoman Turks several decades later.
Ottoman expansion in the region began in the second half of the 14th century, as the Byzantine Empire continued to lose its grip on the region after several defeats to the Ottomans. In 1362, the Ottoman Turks conquered Adrianople (now Edirne, Turkey). This was the start of their conquest of the Balkan Peninsula, which lasted for more than a century. Other states in the area starting falling like Serbia after the Siege of Smederevo in 1459, Bulgaria in 1396, Byzantine Empire in 1453, Bosnia in 1463, Herzegovina in 1482, and Montenegro in 1496. The conquest was made easier for the Ottomans due to existing divisions among the Orthodox peoples and by the even deeper rift that had existed at the time between the Eastern and Western Christians of Europe.
The Albanians under Skanderbeg leadership resisted the Ottomans for a time (1443–1468) by using guerilla warfare. Skanderbeg's achievements, in particular the Battle of Albulena and the First Siege of Krujë won him fame across Europe. The Ottomans eventually conquered the near entirety of the Balkans and reached central Europe by the early 16th century.
Some smaller countries, such as Montenegro managed to retain some autonomy by managing their own internal affairs, since the territory was too mountainous to completely subdue.Stephen Clissold (1966). A short history of Yugoslavia from earliest times to 1966, chapter III Another small country that retained its independence, both de facto and de jure in this case, was the Adriatic trading hub of Ragusa (now Dubrovnik, Croatia).By the end of the 16th century, the Ottoman Empire had become the controlling force in the region after expanding from Anatolia through Thrace to the Balkans. Many people in the Balkans place their greatest folk heroes in the era of either the onslaught or the retreat of the Ottoman Empire. As examples, for Greeks, Constantine XI Palaiologos and Kolokotronis; and for Serbs, Miloš Obilić, Tsar Lazar and Karađorđe; for Albanians, George Kastrioti Skanderbeg; for ethnic Macedonians, Nikola KarevConsidered a Bulgarian in Bulgaria and Goce Delčev; for Bulgarians, Vasil Levski, Georgi Sava Rakovski and Hristo Botev and for Croats, Nikola Šubić Zrinjski.
In the past several centuries, because of the frequent Ottoman wars in Europe fought in and around the Balkans and the comparative Ottoman isolation from the mainstream of economic advance (reflecting the shift of Europe's commercial and political centre of gravity towards the Atlantic Ocean), the Balkans have been the least developed part of Europe. According to Halil İnalcık, "The population of the Balkans, according to one estimate, fell from a high of 8 million in the late 16th-century to only 3 million by the mid-eighteenth. This estimate is based on Ottoman documentary evidence". An economic and social history of the Ottoman Empire. Suraiya Faroqhi, Donald Quataert (1997). Cambridge University Press. p. 652.
Most of the Balkan nation-states emerged during the 19th and early 20th centuries as they gained independence from the Ottoman or Habsburg empires: Greece in 1821, Serbia and Montenegro in 1878, Romania in 1881, Bulgaria in 1908 and Albania in 1912.
World War I was sparked in the Balkans in 1914 when members of Young Bosnia, a revolutionary organization with predominantly Serb and pro-Yugoslav members, assassinated the Austro-Hungarian heir Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Bosnia and Herzegovina's capital, Sarajevo. That caused a war between Austria-Hungary and Serbia, which—through the existing chains of alliances—led to the World War I. The Ottoman Empire soon joined the Central Powers becoming one of the three empires participating in that alliance. The next year Bulgaria joined the Central Powers attacking Serbia, which was successfully fighting Austria-Hungary to the north for a year. That led to Serbia's defeat and the intervention of the Entente in the Balkans which sent an expeditionary force to establish a new Macedonian front, the third one of that war, which soon also became static. The participation of Greece in the war three years later, in 1918, on the part of the Entente finally altered the balance between the opponents leading to the collapse of the common German-Bulgarian front there, which caused the exit of Bulgaria from the war, and in turn, the end of World War I and the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Encyclopedia of World War I, Spencer Tucker, Priscilla Mary Roberts, p. 242
Between the two wars, in order to maintain the geopolitical status quo in the region after the end of World War I, the Balkan Pact, or Balkan Entente, was formed by a treaty between Greece, Romania, Turkey and Yugoslavia on 9 February 1934 in Athens.
With the start of the World War II, all Balkan countries, with the exception of Greece, were allies of Nazi Germany, having bilateral military agreements or being part of the Axis Pact. Fascist Italy expanded the war in the Balkans by using its protectorate Albania to invade Greece. After repelling the attack, the Greeks counterattacked, invading Italy-held Albania and causing Nazi Germany's intervention in the Balkans to help its ally. Europe in Flames, J. Klam, 2002, p. 41 Days before the German invasion, a successful coup d'état in Belgrade by neutral military personnel seized power.Russia's life-saver, Albert Loren Weeks, 2004, p. 98
Although the new government reaffirmed its intentions to fulfill its obligations as a member of the Axis, Germany, with Bulgaria, invaded both Greece and Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia immediately disintegrated when those loyal to the Serbian King and the Croatian units mutinied. Greece resisted, but, after two months of fighting, collapsed and was occupied. The two countries were partitioned between the three Axis allies, Bulgaria, Germany and Italy, and the Independent State of Croatia, a puppet state of Italy and Germany.
During the occupation, the population suffered considerable hardship due to repression and starvation, to which the population reacted by creating a mass resistance movement. Inside Hitler's Greece: The Experience of Occupation, Mark Mazower, 1993 Together with the early and extremely heavy winter of that year (which caused hundreds of thousands of deaths among the poorly fed population), the German invasion had disastrous effects in the timetable of the planned invasion in Russia causing a significant delay, Hermann Goring: Hitler's Second-In-Command, Fred Ramen, 2002, p. 61 which had major consequences during the course of the war.The encyclopedia of codenames of World War II#Marita, Christopher Chant, 1986, pp. 125–126
Finally, at the end of 1944, the Soviets entered Romania and Bulgaria forcing the Germans out of the Balkans. They left behind a region largely ruined as a result of wartime exploitation.
However, despite being under communist governments, Yugoslavia (1948) and Albania (1961) fell out with the Soviet Union. Yugoslavia, led by Marshal Josip Broz Tito (1892–1980), first propped up then rejected the idea of merging with Bulgaria and instead sought closer relations with the West, later even spearheaded, together with India and Egypt the Non-Aligned Movement. Albania on the other hand gravitated toward Communist China, later adopting an isolationism position.
On 28 February 1953, Greece, Turkey and Yugoslavia signed the treaty of Agreement of Friendship and Cooperation in Ankara to form the Balkan Pact of 1953. The treaty's aim was to deter Soviet Union expansion in the Balkans and eventual creation of a joint military staff for the three countries. When the pact was signed, Turkey and Greece were members of the NATO, while Yugoslavia was a non-aligned communist state. With the Pact, Yugoslavia was able to indirectly associate itself with NATO. Though it was planned for the pact to remain in force for 20 years, it dissolved in 1960.
As the only non-communist countries, Greece and Turkey were (and still are) part of NATO composing the southeastern wing of the alliance.
From the dissolution of Yugoslavia, six states achieved internationally recognized sovereignty: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia; all of them are traditionally included in the Balkans which is often a controversial matter of dispute. In 2008, while under UN administration, Kosovo declared independence (according to the official Serbian policy, Kosovo is still an internal autonomous region). In July 2010, the International Court of Justice, ruled that the declaration of independence was legal. Most UN member states recognise Kosovo. After the end of the wars a revolution broke in Serbia and Slobodan Milošević, the Serbian communist leader (elected president between 1989 and 2000), was overthrown and handed for a trial to the International Criminal Tribunal for crimes against the International Humanitarian Law during the Yugoslav wars. Milošević died of a heart attack in 2006 before a verdict could have been released. Ιn 2001 an Albanian uprising in North Macedonia (North Macedonia) forced the country to give local autonomy to the ethnic Albanians in the areas where they predominate.
With the dissolution of Yugoslavia, an issue emerged over the name under which the former (federated) republic of Macedonia would internationally be recognized, between the new country and Greece. Being the Macedonian part of Yugoslavia (see Vardar Macedonia), the federated republic under the Yugoslav identity had the name (Socialist) Republic of Macedonia on which it declared its sovereignty in 1991. Greece, having a large homonymous region (see Macedonia), opposed the usage of the name as an indication of a nationality and ethnicity. Thus dubbed Macedonia naming dispute was resolved under UN mediation in the June 2018 Prespa agreement was reached, which saw the country's renaming into North Macedonia in 2019.
Balkan countries control the direct European route between Western Europe and South-West Asia (Asia Minor and the Middle East). Since 2000, all Balkan countries are friendly towards the EU and the US.
Greece has been a member of the EU since 1981, while Slovenia is a member since 2004, Bulgaria and Romania are members since 2007, and Croatia is a member since 2013. In 2005, the EU decided to start accession negotiations with candidate countries; Turkey, and North Macedonia were accepted as candidates for EU membership. In 2012, Montenegro started accession negotiations with the EU. In 2014, Albania is an official candidate for accession to the EU. In 2015, Serbia was expected to start accession negotiations with the EU, however this process has been stalled over the recognition of Kosovo as an independent state by existing EU member states.
Greece and Turkey have been NATO members since 1952. In March 2004, Bulgaria, Romania and Slovenia have become members of NATO. As of April 2009, Ceremony marks the accession of Albania to NATO, NATO – News, 7 April 2009. Retrieved 18 April 2009. Albania and Croatia are members of NATO. Montenegro joined in June 2017. The most recent member state to be added to NATO was North Macedonia on 27 March 2020.
Almost all other countries have expressed a desire to join the EU, NATO, or both at some point in the future.
As nations in the Western Balkans opened up to private investment in the 1990s, newly created enterprises (mostly SMEs) fueled regional economic development by facilitating the transition from a massive State ownership to a market economy.
SMEs now account for 99% of all active businesses, up to 81% of total value created, and 72% of total employment in the Western Balkans.The Western Balkans are mostly bank-based economies, with bank credit serving as the primary source of external capital for all enterprises, including SMEs. Despite this, the region's bank credit supply is limited and undeveloped. A recent analysis from the European Investment Bank estimated the funding deficit to be at US$2.8 billion, or around 2.5% of nominal GDP.
In most Western Balkan markets, international banks have a market share of 70% to 90%. At the end of 2023, the macroeconomic environment in the Western Balkans indicates that risks are increasing, threatening to worsen the financial imbalance. Recent survey findings give conflicting data on enterprises' funding circumstances. While supply has fallen as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and interest rate increasers, it has showed progressive recovery.
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Islam has a significant history in the region where Muslims make up a large percentage of the population. A 2013 estimate placed the total Muslim population of the Balkans at around eight million.
Islam is the largest religion in nations like Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Kosovo with significant minorities in Bulgaria, North Macedonia and Montenegro. Smaller populations of Muslims are also found in Romania, Serbia and Greece.
| Bulgaria: 59% (Bulgarian Orthodox Church) | Islam (8%) and undeclared (27%) |
| Greece: 81–90% (Greek Orthodox Church) | Islam (2%), Catholicism, other and undeclared |
| Montenegro: 72% (Serbian Orthodox Church) | Islam (19%), Catholicism (3%), other and undeclared (5%) |
| North Macedonia: 64% (Macedonian Orthodox Church) | Islam (33%), Catholicism |
| Romania: 81% (Romanian Orthodox Church) | Protestantism (6%), Catholicism (5%), other and undeclared (8%) |
| Serbia: 84% (Serbian Orthodox Church) | Catholicism (5%), Islam (3%), Protestantism (1%), other and undeclared (6%) |
| Croatia (86%) | Eastern Orthodoxy (4%), Islam (1%), other and undeclared (7%) |
| Slovenia (57%) | Islam (2%), Orthodox (2%), other and undeclared (36%) |
| Albania (58%) | Catholicism (10%), Orthodoxy (7%), other and undeclared (24%) |
| Bosnia and Herzegovina (51%) | Orthodoxy (31%), Catholicism (15%), other and undeclared (4%) |
| Kosovo (95%) | Catholicism (2%), Orthodoxy (2%), other and undeclared (1%) |
| Turkey (90–99%) | Orthodoxy, Irreligious (5%–10%) |
The Jewish communities of the Balkans were some of the oldest in Europe and date back to ancient times. These communities were Sephardi Jews, except in Croatia and Slovenia, where the Jewish communities were mainly Ashkenazi Jews. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, the small and close-knit Jewish community is 90% Sephardic, and Judeo-Spanish is still spoken among the elderly. The Sephardi Jewish cemetery in Sarajevo has tombstones of a unique shape and inscribed in ancient Ladino. European Jewish Congress – Bosnia-Herzegovina, Accessed 15 July 2008. Sephardi Jews used to have a large presence in the city of Thessaloniki, and by 1900, some 80,000, or more than half of the population, were Jews. The Jewish communities in the Balkans suffered immensely during World War II, and the vast majority were killed during the The Holocaust. An exception were the Bulgarian Jews who Boris III of Bulgaria sent to forced labor camps instead of Nazi concentration camps. Almost all of the few survivors have emigrated to the (then) newly founded state of Israel and elsewhere. Almost no Balkan country today has a significant Jewish minority.
| 98% Albanian | 2% other | |
| 53% Bosnian language | 31% Serbian (official), 15% Croatian (official), 2% other | |
| 86% Bulgarian | 8% Turkish, 4% Romani, 1% other, 1% unspecified | |
| 96% Croatian | 1% Serbian, 3% other | |
| 99% Greek language | 1% other | |
| 94% Albanian | 2% Bosnian, 2% Serbian (official), 1% Turkish, 1% other | |
| 43% Serbian language | 37% Montenegrin (official), 5% Albanian, 5% Bosnian, 5% other, 4% unspecified | |
| 67% Macedonian | 25% Albanian (official), 4% Turkish, 2% Romani, 1% Serbian, 2% other | |
| 85% Romanian | 6% Hungarian, 1% Romani language | |
| 88% Serbian | 3% Hungarian, 2% Bosnian, 1% Romani, 3% other, 2% unspecified | |
| 91% Slovene language | 5% Serbo-Croatian, 4% other | |
| 85% Turkish language | 12% Kurdish language, 3% other and unspecified | |
A list of largest cities:
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| Tekirdağ | 1,055,412 | 1,055,412 | 2019 | |
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| Edirne | 413,903 | 306,464 | 2019 | |
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| Kırklareli | 361,836 | 259,302 | 2019 | |
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| Split | 325,600 | 161,312 | 2021 |
Only the European part of Istanbul is a part of the Balkans.
It is home to two-thirds of the city's 15,519,267 inhabitants.
| b. | As The World Factbook
target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> cites, regarding Turkey and Southeastern Europe; "that portion of Turkey west of the Bosphorus is geographically part of Europe". |
| c. | The population only of East Thrace, that excludes the Anatolia, which otherwise has a population of 75,627,384 and a density of 97. |
| d. | See: (2025). 9789639052659, Centre for Regional Studies. ISBN 9789639052659 |
| e. | See: |
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