Flag of Somalia

What the flag of Somalia looks like

The flag of Somalia is a plain light blue rectangle with a white five-pointed star in the middle. The ratio is 2:3, and the star is placed with one point facing upward. There is no border, text or emblem.

The blue is a light, sky-blue shade. It was selected in tribute to the United Nations. A small version of the design is used for the Somalia flag emoji.

Somalia flag meaning and symbolism

The blue color of the flag was selected in tribute to the United Nations, which helped to form the country during its status as a trust territory from 1950 to 1960. The blue is now also officially said to denote the sky as well as the Gulf of Aden, the Guardafui Channel and the Somali Sea, which flank the country. The white star, called the Star of Unity, is the main symbol. Its five points represent the five main areas where the Somali ethnic group forms the indigenous majority:

• the former Italian Somaliland, in the south
• the former British Somaliland, in the north
• French Somaliland, now Djibouti
• the Somali region of Ethiopia (the Ogaden)
• the North Eastern Province of Kenya

In the years after independence, Somali leaders hoped these areas would join together in a single state. That dream, often called Greater Somalia, was a political aim of the new nation. It was never realized, and the borders were fixed through conflicts, including the Ogaden War with Ethiopia in 1977-78.

History of the Somali flag

Somalia's flag is linked to the end of colonial rule. After World War II, the former Italian colony became a UN trust territory under Italian administration, from 1950, with independence promised after ten years. In order to give the territory its own symbol, the Somali Youth League had long pressed for a national flag, and in 1954 the Somali scholar Mohammed Awale Liban broke a deadlock between rival parties by designing one. It was approved by the territorial council on 12 October 1954.

The same flag was used by the short-lived independent State of Somaliland (the former British protectorate) from 26 June to 1 July 1960. On 1 July 1960 the trust territory merged with it to form the Somali Republic, and the flag became the national flag of the new country. It has stayed the same through the republic, the military government of Siad Barre from 1969, and the collapse of central authority in 1991. Later governments, including the Transitional Federal Government and the current Federal Government of Somalia, kept the same flag.

Other flags are used within the country. Somaliland, which declared independence from Somalia in 1991 and has not gained general international recognition, prohibits the public display of the Somali flag and uses its own horizontal green, white and red flag with Arabic script and a black star. Some of the regional states within the federal system have their own flags too. These do not replace the national flag, which is the one recognized internationally.