Neum | |
|---|---|
Town andmunicipality | |
 Neum | |
 Flag  Coat of arms | |
 Location of Neum municipality within Bosnia and Herzegovina | |
 Interactive map of Neum | |
| Coordinates:42°55′30″N17°37′00″E / 42.92500°N 17.61667°E /42.92500; 17.61667 | |
| Country |  Bosnia and Herzegovina |
| Entity | Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina |
| Canton |  Herzegovina-Neretva |
| Geographicalregion | Herzegovina |
| Government | |
| • Municipal mayor | Dragan Jurković (HDZ BiH) |
| Area | |
• Town andmunicipality | 246.03 km2 (94.99 sq mi) |
| Population (2013 census) | |
• Town andmunicipality | 4,653 |
| • Density | 22/km2 (57/sq mi) |
| • Urban | 3,013 |
| • Rural | 1,640 |
| Time zone | UTC+1 (CET) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC+2 (CEST) |
| Area code | +387 36 |
| Website | www |
Neum (pronounced[něum]) is a town and municipality inBosnia and Herzegovina, located inHerzegovina-Neretva Canton of theFederation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is the only town on the Bosnia and Herzegovina coastline, making it the country's only access to theAdriatic Sea. As of 2022, Neum municipality was estimated to have had a population of 4,358 inhabitants,[1] although Neum had a population of 4,653 in 2013,[2] with 3,013 of those living within the town of Neum itself.[3]
Neum is the only town situated along Bosnia and Herzegovina's 20-kilometre (12 mi) coastline,[4] making it the country's only access to theAdriatic Sea.[5] It is enclosed by theKlek Peninsula, which itself is separated from theAdriatic Sea by thePelješac peninsula
Neum is 47 km (29 mi) northwest ofDubrovnik, 50 km (31 mi) south ofMostar, and 122 km (76 mi) southwest ofSarajevo, the country's capital.
The Bosnia and Herzegovina coastal strip of Neum cuts off the southernmost Croatianexclave from the rest ofCroatia. This is a result of theTreaty of Karlowitz of 1699. Since 1991 and thebreakup of Yugoslavia, the border between Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Neum region has been an international border.[6]
The municipality includes the town of Neum (municipal seat) and several villages:[7]
Babin Do,Borut,Brestica,Broćanac,Brštanica,Cerovica,Cerovo,Crnoglav,Dobri Do,Dobrovo,Donji Drijen,Donji Zelenikovac,Dubravica,Duži,Glumina,Gornje Hrasno,Gradac,Hotanj Hutovski,Hutovo,Kiševo,Moševići,Prapratnica,Previš,Rabrani,Vinine andŽukovica.
Neum has two border crossing checkpoints with Croatia on theEuropean route E65 orAdriatic Highway which connects the two parts of Croatia's Dalmatian coast. Neum 1 is located to the northwest of the city, with theKlek border checkpoint on the Croatian side. Neum 2 is located to the southeast, with the Croatian border checkpoint atZaton Doli.
The Neum corridor dates back to theTreaty of Karlowitz of 1699, whereby theRepublic of Ragusa was separated from theDalmatian possessions of its rivalVenice by twobuffer zones ceded by Ragusa to theOttoman Empire to prevent the possibility of Venice invading via land:[8][9] north of its territory is Neum and the bay of Klek, and south of its territory isSutorina with the port ofHerceg Novi on theBay of Kotor, part ofMontenegro since 1947 (later the topic of the now-resolvedSutorina dispute).
The Karlowitz borders were reaffirmed in 1718 by theTreaty of Passarowitz, but then theOttomans, tired of negotiating in vain withVenice for a widening of their maritime access, simply usurped the territory of Gornji Klek and most ofKlek from Ragusa, which it had bought fromKingDabiša of Bosnia at the end of the 14th century. After thefall of the Republic of Venice in 1797, and theCongress of Vienna in 1815, theAustrian Empire, which had annexed both theDalmatian possessions of Venice and the territory of Ragusa, tried to buy back the Neum and Sutorina enclaves from the Ottomans, but in vain. Instead, it stationed a warship to block access to the port of Neum until theTreaty of Berlin, which gave the whole ofBosnia and Herzegovina toAustria-Hungary in 1878. Neum had been underOttoman control for 179 years.
Consideration was given to a plan to build a new advanced naval base at Neum-Klek by theAustro-Hungarian Navy. GeneralFranz Conrad von Hötzendorf considered fortifying Neum with coastal batteries and torpedo craft to supplement seafront defenses (in order to preventItalian raids, or worse a large scale Italian landing). The project never got past the planning stage prior to theoutbreak ofWorld War I in 1914.[10]
_Neum_2024_1.jpg)
In 1918, as a consequence ofAustro-Hungarian defeat, Neum joined theKingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes which would become the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1929. Under theKarađorđević dynasty, the Yugoslav Government ignored the historical borders twice: in 1929, when the Neum area was included in theLittoral Banovina, and in 1939 when, following theCvetković–Maček Agreement, it was included in theBanovina of Croatia.Josip Broz Tito'sfederal Yugoslavia was founded on the principle, declared at the1943 AVNOJ session inJajce and comparatively well-respected by theĐilas commission in 1945, of establishing the federative republics in their borders of 1878, which is why the Neum enclave is now part of independent Bosnia and Herzegovina, including most of Klek (Ponta Kleka, Rep Kleka), the two isletsVeliki andMali Školj and the rock of Lopata in the Bay of Klek.[11]
Since the 1990s, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina have been in negotiations on how to handle traffic across the Neum region, including signing aNeum Agreement. WhenCroatia was admitted to theEuropean Union in 2013, the border crossings in the Neum region became governed asexternal borders of the EU.[citation needed] The construction and opening in 2022 of thePelješac Bridge, which bypasses Neum entirely, has significance for Croatia's integrity and also for itsSchengen Area membership and the EU as a whole. It significantly improves traffic flow and the traffic connection ofDubrovnik to the rest of mainland Croatia, avoiding negotiating long, costly queues at Neum, and strict customs checks twice within the space of 20 kilometres (12 mi).
Encouraged by the recent developments inCroatia–Slovenia border disputes (June 2017), the rulingBosniakParty of Democratic Action (SDA) and other Bosniak political parties decided to obstruct[citation needed] the construction.
The construction cost was €420 million, to which the EU contributed by allocating €357 million from Cohesion Policy funds. The bridge is among the largest infrastructures in Croatia currently and one of the most substantial EU infrastructural investment ever. The work was completed in mid 2022. The EU is also funding supporting infrastructure, such as the construction of access roads, including tunnels, bridges and viaducts, the building of an 8 km-long bypass near the town of Ston and upgrading works on the existing road D414.[12]
There are Bosniak plans to convert Neum to a freight port, contrary to the wishes of the local population and international laws and agreements concerning the ecologically significant and protectedBay of Mali Ston, of which Bay of Neum is a part. There are plans to build a seaport, rail and a motorway and thus the Croatian bridge must have a high clearance according to the view of Bosnia and Herzegovina's Bosniak political parties. Due to the above, the Republic of Croatia has significantly increased the height of the bridge by adapting it to ships whose dimensions cannot enter the Bay of Neum at all. Today the main freight port for Bosnia and Herzegovina isPloče (in Croatia) farther north, which has arailway to Bosnia and Herzegovina.[13]
Neum has a borderlinehumid subtropical climate (Köppen climate classification:Cfa) andhot-summer mediterranean climate (Köppen climate classification:Csa), because only one summer month has a mean precipitation not exceeding 40 mm (1.6 in) and summer receives significant precipitation, despite the Mediterranean precipitation pattern. As a typical feature of the Mediterranean precipitation pattern, the mean precipitation in winter is three times higher than the mean precipitation in summer. The mean yearly precipitation observed is of 1,316 mm (51.8 in). The dominant winds come from the north, north-east and north-west. The average sea temperature (as observed in Neum) ranges from 13 °C (55 °F) in January to 28 °C (82 °F) in July and August.
The natural vegetation is evergreenMediterranean flora, and subtropical flora (palm trees,agaves,cacti) grow in Neum and its surroundings.
| Climate data for Neum | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
| Mean daily maximum °C (°F) | 9.7 (49.5) | 11.3 (52.3) | 14.3 (57.7) | 17.5 (63.5) | 22.5 (72.5) | 26.2 (79.2) | 29.7 (85.5) | 29.4 (84.9) | 25.9 (78.6) | 20.6 (69.1) | 14.8 (58.6) | 11.2 (52.2) | 19.4 (67.0) |
| Daily mean °C (°F) | 6.6 (43.9) | 7.9 (46.2) | 10.2 (50.4) | 13.0 (55.4) | 17.6 (63.7) | 21.2 (70.2) | 24.4 (75.9) | 24.2 (75.6) | 20.9 (69.6) | 16.3 (61.3) | 11.4 (52.5) | 8.2 (46.8) | 15.2 (59.4) |
| Mean daily minimum °C (°F) | 3.6 (38.5) | 4.5 (40.1) | 6.1 (43.0) | 8.6 (47.5) | 12.7 (54.9) | 16.3 (61.3) | 19.2 (66.6) | 19.0 (66.2) | 16.0 (60.8) | 12.1 (53.8) | 8.0 (46.4) | 5.2 (41.4) | 10.9 (51.7) |
| Averageprecipitation mm (inches) | 135 (5.3) | 123 (4.8) | 106 (4.2) | 100 (3.9) | 75 (3.0) | 59 (2.3) | 38 (1.5) | 52 (2.0) | 88 (3.5) | 127 (5.0) | 174 (6.9) | 172 (6.8) | 1,249 (49.2) |
| [citation needed] | |||||||||||||
The settlement is predominantly composed ofCroats.Bosniaks are the second-largest demographic, followed bySerbs. Other ethnicities includeAlbanians,Montenegrins andYugoslavs.
| Ethnic composition – Neum town | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013. | 1991. | 1981. | 1971. | |||
| Total | 3,013 (100%) | 1,651 (100%) | 602 (100%) | 360 (100%) | ||
| Croats | 2,938 (97.51%) | 1,338 (81.04%) | 499 (82.89%) | 335 (93.06%) | ||
| Bosniaks | 33 (1.161%) | 89 (5.391%) | 17 (2.824%) | 3 (0.833%) | ||
| Serbs | 21 (0.697%) | 98 (5.936%) | 25 (4.153%) | 10 (2.778%) | ||
| Unaffiliated | 6 (0.199%) | |||||
| Albanians | 3 (0.1%) | 4 (0.664%) | ||||
| Unknown | 3 (0.1%) | |||||
| Others | 3 (0.100%) | 36 (2.180%) | 3 (0.498%) | 5 (1.389%) | ||
| Yugoslavs | 2 (0.066%) | 90 (5.451%) | 47 (7.807%) | 7 (1.944%) | ||
| Montenegrins | 2 (0.066%) | 6 (0.997%) | ||||
| Macedonians | 1 (0.166%) | |||||
| Ethnic composition – Neum municipality | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013. | 1991. | 1981. | |||||
| Total | 4,960 (100%) | 4,325 (100%) | 4,030 (100%) | ||||
| Croats | 4,543 (97.64%) | 3,792 (87.68%) | 3,575 (88.71%) | ||||
| Bosniaks | 63 (1.397%) | 190 (4.393%) | 157 (3.896%) | ||||
| Serbs | 21 (0.451%) | 207 (4.786%) | 179 (4.442%) | ||||
| Unaffiliated | 7 (0.15%) | ||||||
| Unknown | 7 (0.15%) | ||||||
| Albanians | 3 (0.064%) | 5 (0.124%) | |||||
| Others | 3 (0.064%) | 46 (1.064%) | 17 (0.422%) | ||||
| Yugoslavs | 2 (0.043%) | 90 (2.081%) | 89 (2.208%) | ||||
| Montenegrins | 2 (0.043%) | 7 (0.174%) | |||||
| Macedonians | 1 (0.025%) | ||||||
Thelinđo is traditionally danced in the Neum region.[14] Neum celebrates the feast ofOur Lady of Good Health as its municipal day. As part of the celebrations, Neum hosts the Music Festival Etnofest Neum. The town also hosts the Neum Animated Film Festival.[15]
Neum is home to local branches of the cultural organizationsMatica hrvatska andHKD Napredak.[16][17]
Popular activities includeswimming,sun bathing,beach-going,boating, and various other water-sports. Neum has a water polo club VK Jadran Neum, which is a member of theCroatian Water Polo Federation.
There is also an association football club HNK Neum.
_in_Neum.jpg)
Neum has steep hills, stone-sandy beaches, and several large touristhotels. Neum has about 7,000 beds for tourists,[18] 1,810 in hotels with the remaining capacity in motels, villas, and private accommodation.Tourism in Neum is active only in the coastal region. Prices tend to be lower than in neighbouringCroatia,[19] making it popular with shoppers. Tourism, and thecommerce it brings, is the leading contributor to the economy of the area.
The inland area behind Neum has a richarcheological history andwilderness with centuries-old olive groves.
(in Croatian and English)
Neum travel guide from Wikivoyage
Geographic data related toNeum atOpenStreetMapMunicipalities of theHerzegovina-Neretva Canton | ||
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42°55′30″N17°37′00″E / 42.92500°N 17.61667°E /42.92500; 17.61667
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