Bosnian Serbs in the context of "May Declaration"

An independence referendum was held in the Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina between 29 February and 1 March 1992, following the first free elections of 1990 and the rise of ethnic tensions that eventually led to the breakup of Yugoslavia. Independence was strongly favoured by Muslim and Bosnian Croat voters while Bosnian Serbs boycotted the referendum or were prevented from participating by Bosnian Serb authorities.

The total turnout of voters was 64%, 99.7% of whom voted for independence. On 3 March, the Chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina Alija Izetbegović declared the independence of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the parliament ratified the action. On 6 April, the United States and the European Economic Community recognized Bosnia and Herzegovina as an independent state and on 22 May it was admitted into the United Nations.

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand was one of the key events that led to World War I. Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, were assassinated on 28 June 1914 by Bosnian Serb student Gavrilo Princip. They were shot at close range while being driven through Sarajevo, the provincial capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, formally annexed by Austria-Hungary in 1908.

Princip was part of a group of six Bosnian assassins together with Muhamed Mehmedbašić, Vaso Čubrilović, Nedeljko Čabrinović, Cvjetko Popović and Trifko Grabež coordinated by Danilo Ilić; all but one were Bosnian Serbs and members of a student revolutionary group that later became known as Young Bosnia. The political objective of the assassination was to free Bosnia and Herzegovina of Austro-Hungarian rule and establish a common South Slav ("Yugoslav") state. The assassination precipitated the July Crisis, which led to Austria-Hungary declaring war on Serbia and the start of World War I.

As with all modern European nations, a large degree of 'biological continuity' exists between Bosnians and Bosniaks and their ancient predecessors with Y chromosomal lineages testifying to predominantly Paleolithic European ancestry. Studies based on bi-allelic markers of the NRY (non-recombining region of the Y-chromosome) have shown the three main ethnic groups of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Bosniaks, Bosnian Serbs and Bosnian Croats) to share, in spite of some quantitative differences, a large fraction of the same ancient gene pool distinct for the region. Analysis of autosomal STRs have moreover revealed no significant difference between the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina and neighbouring populations.

The Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (SR Bosnia and Herzegovina; Serbo-Croatian: Socijalistička Republika Bosna i Hercegovina / Социјалистичка Pепублика Босна и Херцеговина), commonly referred to as Socialist Bosnia or simply Bosnia, was one of the six constituent federal states forming the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. It was a predecessor of the modern-day Bosnia and Herzegovina, existing between 1945 and 1992, under a number of different formal names, including Democratic Bosnia and Herzegovina (1943–1946) and People's Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (1946–1963).

Within Yugoslavia, Bosnia and Herzegovina was a unique federal state with no dominant ethnic group, as was the case in other constituent states, all of which were also nation states of Yugoslavia's South Slavic ethnic groups. It was administered under strict terms of sanctioned consociationalism, known locally as "ethnic key" or "national key" (Serbo-Croatian: etnički/nacionalni ključ), based on the balance of political representation of 3 largest ethnic groups (Bosnian Muslims, Croats and Serbs).

The Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Serbo-Croatian: Republika Bosna i Hercegovina / Република Босна и Херцеговина) was a state in Southeastern Europe, existing from 1992 to 1995. It is the direct legal predecessor to the modern-day state of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Bosnia and Herzegovina seceded from the disintegrating Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on 3 March 1992. The Bosnian War broke out soon after its Declaration of Independence and lasted for 3 years. Leaders from two of the three main ethnicities of Bosnia and Herzegovina, namely the Serbs and the Croats, separately established their separatist quasi-states of Republika Srpska and the Croatian Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia, respectively, which were unrecognized by the Bosnian state and international governments. With the majority of Bosnian Serbs and Croats opting for their respective separatist states, the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina in reality came to be primarily supported by Bosniaks, while formally the presidency and government of the republic was still composed of Serbs and Croats along with Bosniaks and thus had a multi-ethnic character.

Ethnic cleansing occurred during the Bosnian War (1992–95) as large numbers of Bosniaks and Croats were forced to flee their homes or were expelled by the Army of Republika Srpska and Serb paramilitaries. Bosnian Serbs had also been forced to flee or were expelled by Bosniaks and Bosnian Croat forces, though on a restricted scale and in lesser numbers. A lot of Bosnian Croats were also expelled by the Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, but once again, on a restricted scale. The UN Security Council Final Report (1994) states while Bosniaks also engaged in "grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions and other violations of international humanitarian law", they "have not engaged in "systematic ethnic cleansing". According to the report, "there is no factual basis for arguing that there is a 'moral equivalence' between the warring factions".

Beginning in 1991, political upheavals in Bosnia and Herzegovina displaced about 2.7 million people by mid-1992, of which over 700,000 sought asylum in other European countries, making it the largest exodus in Europe at the time since World War II. It is estimated between 1.0 and 1.3 million people were uprooted in these ethnic cleansing campaigns, and that tens of thousands were killed.

The Independent Democratic Party (Serbo-Croatian: Samostalna demokratska stranka, Самостална демократска странка; Slovene: Samostojna demokratska stranka, SDS) was a social liberal political party in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, and later the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. It was established by Svetozar Pribićević as a breakaway faction of the Democratic Party in 1924. It was formed by three different groups: by far the largest group were the Serbs from the areas of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire, that is Croatian, Bosnian and Vojvodina Serbs, with the prevalence of the first. The second most influential group were Slovene centralist liberals. The third group was composed by Croat liberals, mostly from Dalmatia and Zagreb.

In the first three years of its existence, the party supported a strong central Yugoslav government, fiercely opposing the federalism of the Croatian Peasant Party, the Croatian nationalism and the Croatian Party of Rights, ethnic Serbian hegemonism of the People's Radical Party, and Slovenian and Bosnian quests for territorial autonomy, supported respectively by the Slovene People's Party and the Yugoslav Muslim Organization. In 1927, however, they reached an agreement with Stjepan Radić's Croatian Peasant Party, forming the Peasant-Democratic Opposition, which demanded a decentralization of Yugoslavia. After the establishment of the royal dictatorship of King Alexander I of Yugoslavia in January 1929, the party was officially dissolved, but continued to function underground, while its president Svetozar Pribićević went into exile. Many of its members joined the officially sponsored Yugoslav Radical Peasants' Democracy (renamed to Yugoslav National Party in 1933), including the great majority of its Slovenian members.