Flag of Uzbekistan

How to read it

The Law on the State Flag (No. 407-XII) was adopted by the Supreme Council on 18 November 1991. Its article 4, as reworded in 2010, describes a rectangle of three horizontal stripes of rich blue, white and rich green running the full length of the flag. The flag is 250 cm long and 125 cm wide (about 98 by 49 inches): each stripe 40 cm (15¾ in) deep, with a red edge 2.5 cm (1 in) wide along each side of the white. The white crescent and twelve white five-pointed stars are on both faces, on the blue stripe beside the staff.

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Where the crescent and stars go

The law places the crescent and stars inside a rectangle 75 by 30 cm on the centre line of the blue stripe. The crescent stands upright with its tips pointing away from the staff, inside a circle 30 cm across, 20 cm from the staff. Each star fits a circle 6 cm across, 6 cm apart, in three rows: three stars at the top, four in the middle and five at the bottom, the bottom row 3.5 cm from the lower tip of the crescent.

Why twelve stars

The government portal says the stars are a spiritual sign and stand for the historical traditions of the Uzbek people and the ancient solar calendar, and it links them to the rise of astrology, which it calls a scientific field, in the states that once stood on Uzbekistan’s territory. It says blue was the colour of Timur’s state flag. The encyclopedia Store norske leksikon gives a different reading: that the crescent and stars are arranged to write the name of God, Allah, in Arabic script.

Telling it from Sierra Leone’s flag

Sierra Leone’s flag also has three horizontal stripes of blue, white and green, but its constitution gives the design as those three stripes alone, green at the top and blue at the bottom. Uzbekistan’s has blue at the top, red lines along the white and a crescent and twelve stars.