 250px|thumb|right|the abandoned prison on goli otok thumb|right|goli otok and its neighboring islands goli otok (; literal translation: barren island, ) is a barren, uninhabited island that was the site of a political prison in use when croatia was part of yugoslavia. the prison was in operation between 1949 and 1989. the island is located in the northern adriatic sea just off the coast of primorje-gorski kotar county, croatia with an area of approximately 4 square kilometers (1.54 square miles). ==goli otok prison== despite having long been an occasional grazing ground for local shepherds' flocks, the barren island was apparently never permanently settled other than during the 20th century. throughout world war i, austria-hungary sent russian prisoners of war from eastern front to goli otok. thumb|right|goli otok seen from the mainland in 1949, the entire island was officially made into a high-security, top secret prison and labor camp run by the authorities of socialist federal republic of yugoslavia, together with the nearby sveti grgur island, which held a similar camp for female prisoners. until 1956, throughout the informbiro period, it was used to incarcerate political prisoners. these included known and alleged stalinists, but also other communist party of yugoslavia members or even nonparty citizens accused of exhibiting sympathy or leanings towards the soviet union. many anticommunist (serbian, croatian, macedonian, albanian and other nationalists etc.) were also incarcerated on goli otok. non-political prisoners were also sent to the island to serve out simple criminal sentencesdonja klada Â» goli otokviÅ¡estruki ubojica s golog otoka opet ubio - jutarnji.hr and some of them were sentenced to death.http://www.karlovacki-tjednik.hr/index.php?name=news&file=article&sid=946&theme=printer a total of approximately 16,000 political prisoners served there, of which between 400 and 600{{cite web|url=http://www.slobodnadalmacija.hr/hrvatska/tabid/66/articletype/articleview/articleid/182162/default.aspx|title=srbija nudi odÅ¡tetu zatvorenicima na g
Defunct_prisons_in_Croatia Islands_of_the_Adriatic_Sea Political_repression_in_Communist_Yugoslavia Prisons_in_Yugoslavia Uninhabited_islands_of_Croatia