Christianity has a long and continuous history in Kosovo which can be traced back to the Roman invasion of the region. During the early and late Middle Ages, the entire Balkan Peninsula had been Christianised initially by the Romans and subsequently by the Byzantine Empire. Followers of the Roman Catholic Church are predominantly Albanians with ethnic Serbs following the Eastern Orthodox Church. In 2008, Protestant pastor Artur Krasniqi, primate of the Kosovo Protestant Evangelical Church, claimed that "as many as 15,000" Kosovar Albanians had converted to Protestantism since 1985.