Breakup of Yugoslavia

Historical eventMay 191991

Breakup of Yugoslavia

Breakup of Yugoslavia: With the local Serb population boycotting the referendum, Croatians voted in favour of independence from Yugoslavia.

Everything on May 19Original source

In context

When
Sunday, May 19 199135 years ago
Category
Historical eventA dated happening — a battle, treaty, launch, discovery, disaster or decision — recorded on this calendar day.
Era
20th century · 1990s
Recorded from
Wikipedia “On this day” feed

At a glance

Dates: From 1991.

What happened

After a period of political and economic crisis in the 1980s, the constituent republics of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia split apart in the early 1990s. Unresolved issues from the breakup caused a series of inter-ethnic Yugoslav Wars from 1991 to 2001 which primarily affected Bosnia and Herzegovina, neighbouring parts of Croatia and, some years later, Kosovo.

May 19 through the years

Other entries on the same calendar day, in order.

  1. 1991Breakup of Yugoslavia
  2. 20072007 Moscow, Idaho, shooting
  3. 2007President of Romania
  4. 2010Royal Thai Armed Forces
  5. 2012Brindisi school bombing
  6. 20122012 Deir ez-Zor bombing
  7. 2015Refugio State Beach
  8. 2015Refugio oil spill
  9. 2016EgyptAir Flight 804
  10. 2018Wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle
  11. 20242024 Varzaqan helicopter crash

Also in 1991

  • September 9TajikistanTajikistan declares independence from the Soviet Union.
  • September 11Continental Express Flight 2574Continental Express Flight 2574 crashes in Colorado County, Texas, near Eagle Lake, killing 11 passengers and three crew.
  • March 14EscondidaEscondida, one of the most productive copper mines in the world, was officially inaugurated.
  • September 12Space Shuttle DiscoveryNASA launches Space Shuttle Discovery on STS-48 to deploy the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite.
  • September 17EstoniaEstonia, North Korea, South Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, the Marshall Islands and Micronesia join the United Nations.
  • September 17LinuxThe first version of the Linux kernel (0.01) is released to the Internet.
  • September 5Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989The current international treaty defending indigenous peoples, Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989, comes into force.
  • October 201991 Uttarkashi earthquakeAn earthquake struck the Indian state of Uttarakhand, killing at least 768 people and destroying thousands of homes.

Everything we record for 1991 →

Sources

Cite this page

“Breakup of Yugoslavia”, What's On This Date, https://whatsonthisdate.com/app/event/breakup-of-yugoslavia-1991-may-19, accessed October 27, 2026.

Cite the underlying source as well — the source links above go to the record this entry is adapted from.

Questions about this entry

When did Breakup of Yugoslavia happen?

May 19 1991 — 35 years ago, on a Sunday.

Where does this text come from?

Wikipedia “On this day” feed. Summaries are short adaptations that link back to the source, not reprints.

How do I cite this page?

Use the ready-made citation near the sources at the bottom of the page, and follow the source link to cite the underlying record as well.

Text adapted from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA 4.0 and from Wikidata (CC0). Images come from Wikimedia Commons; credit and licence are shown with each image. Editorial entries are © What's On This Date. Sources & licensing · How this site works.