Slovakia |
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1.Culture 2.Economy 3.Geography 4.History 5.Tourism |
Slovakia
is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is
bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east,
Hungary to the south, Austria to the southwest, and the
Czech Republic to the northwest. Slovakia's mostly
mountainous territory spans about 49,000 square
kilometers, with a population of over 5.4 million. The
capital and largest city is Bratislava, while the second
largest city is Košice.The Slavs arrived in the
territory of present-day Slovakia in the fifth and sixth
centuries. In the seventh century, they played a
significant role in the creation of Samo's Empire. In
the ninth century, they established the Principality of
Nitra, which was later conquered by the Principality of
Moravia to establish Great Moravia. In the tenth
century, after the dissolution of Great Moravia, the
territory was integrated into the Principality of
Hungary, which would then become the Kingdom of Hungary
in 1000. In 1241 and 1242, after the Mongol invasion of
Europe, much of the territory was destroyed. The area
was recovered largely thanks to Béla IV of Hungary, who
also settled Germans, leading them to become an
important ethnic group in the area, especially in what
are today parts of central and eastern Slovakia. After World War I and the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the state of Czechoslovakia was established. It was the only country in central and eastern Europe to remain a democracy during the interwar period. Nevertheless, local fascist parties gradually came to power in the Slovak lands, and the first Slovak Republic existed during World War II as a partially-recognised client state of Nazi Germany. At the end of World War II, Czechoslovakia was re-established as an independent country. After a coup in 1948, Czechoslovakia came under communist administration, and became a part of the Soviet-led Eastern Bloc. Attempts to liberalise communism in Czechoslovakia culminated in the Prague Spring, which was crushed by the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968. In 1989, the Velvet Revolution peacefully ended the Communist rule in Czechoslovakia. Slovakia became an independent state on 1 January 1993 after the peaceful dissolution of Czechoslovakia, sometimes known as the Velvet Divorce. |
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