Red and Green Flags

Which countries have red and green flags?

• Bangladesh: a red disc slightly off-center on a dark green field.
• Portugal: green at the hoist and red at the fly, with the national coat of arms on the dividing line.
• Belarus: a red band above a green band, with a red and white ornamental pattern at the hoist.
• Maldives: a red field with a large green rectangle holding a white crescent.
• Burkina Faso: horizontal red and green stripes with a yellow star in the center.
• Turkmenistan: green with a red carpet-pattern band, a crescent and five stars.

Flags that add white include Italy, Mexico, Hungary, Bulgaria, Iran, Lebanon, Madagascar, Oman, Algeria and Wales, whose red dragon stands on a green and white field. Pan-African flags include Ghana, Senegal, Mali and Ethiopia, and Pan-Arab flags include Jordan, Kuwait, Syria and the United Arab Emirates.

Bangladesh and Portugal are the easiest to confuse. Bangladesh is a disc on green, while Portugal is a two-color field with a crest.

Why are red and green so common on flags?

The pair appears in several unrelated traditions. Green often stands for land, nature or Islam, and red for blood, courage or revolution. Many flags in the Middle East, Africa and Europe happened to choose both for different reasons.

Italy's tricolor was inspired by the French flag, and the Italian green, white and red were adopted in the 1790s. Mexico followed with its own tricolor after independence. Hungary and Bulgaria use red, white and green in horizontal stripes, and Iran has green, white and red with an emblem in the center.

Bangladesh's flag shows the sun rising over a green land, with the red for blood shed in the 1971 independence war. Portugal adopted its current flag in 1911 after the end of the monarchy. The green and red replaced the old blue and white.