Bosnia and Herzegovina, a recently formed nation-state, claimed sovereignty in October of 1991, dissociating itself from the former Yugoslavia. Situated in the Balkans, it exists between Croatia, and Serbia and Montenegro, but with very little access to the Adriatic given Croatian coastal control. The country has no conventional long form for its name, simply being referred to in all cases as Bosnia and Herzegovina. The government is an emerging federal democratic republic, functioning with universal suffrage and under the civil law syndrome. The country is small both in terms of geographic and population size, being the 129th largest country in both respects.