Serbia is a country in the Balkans region of southern Europe, with Belgrade serving as its capital. In the early 7th century, migrating Slavs formed a principality in Serbia, and it was a kingdom from 1217 to 1346 and an empire from 1346 to 1371, when the empire disintegrated. By the mid-16th century, Serbia was completely overrun by the Ottoman Turks, and the Habsburg Austrians began to expand into central Serbia during the late 17th century. In 1815, the Principality of Serbia was established after Karadorde's revolution against the Ottomans, and its independence was recognized in 1878. Following the disaster of World War I, Serbia spearheaded the creation of Yugoslavia, a state for all South Slavs in the Balkans. Yugoslavia would exist in various forms until the 1990s, when it broke up into smaller countries. Serbia and Montenegro remained united as part of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and Serbia gained independence in 2006 upon the dissolution of the union. In 2008, Kosovo declared independence from Serbia, further decreasing Serbia's size. In 2017, Serbia had a population of 7,058,322 people.
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