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Ethiopia

Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia

Last modified: 2004-12-29 by zeljko heimer
Keywords: ethiopia | panafrican colors | power | faith | church | peace | wealth | love | land | hope | holy trinity | pentagram | lion |
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[Flag of Ethiopia] [National flag and ensign] 1:2
by Zeljko Heimer, 29 August 2001
Flag adopted on 6 February 1996, coat of arms (emblem) adopted 6 February 1996.

See also:

The 1996 National Flag

 This is the new Ethiopian flag, based on information and a picture from the Ethiopian Embassy in Washington DC. The circle only just overlaps the top and bottom bands. The pentagram is actually made of five Y-shapes, each rotated 72 degrees around the centre of the star to make the new one.
Graham Bartram, 2 July 1996

Green-yellow-red tricolour with emblem in the middle. The emblem (also used as the coat of arms) is light blue disk, of diameter (approximatley?) half the hoist inscribed with yellow pentagram symbol. The green seems to be rather dark aproximated in Album 2000 [pay00] as Pantone 349c.
Zeljko Heimer 29 August 2001

The plain tricolour

[Flag of Ethiopia]
by Ivan Sache, 18 July 2000

Probably the most widespread Ethiopina flag in use no matter what the central symbol was official at the given time, is the plain tricolour. I have never seen any supporter waving a flag with the emblem. I first looked after some political meaning in this flag, but this was erroneous. My "definitive" interpretation is that the flag with emblem is complicate and expensive to manufacture, whereas everyone is able to identify correctly a "plain" Ethiopian flag. By the way, the "plain" flag seems to be usually 2:3 in proportion and not 1:2. I would say that the "plain" flag is a kind of non-official "civil" flag.
Ivan Sache, 18 July 2000

For example, the BBC web pages included [in March 2001] paper about withdrawal of the Ethiopian troops from a buffer zone between Ethiopia and Eritrea. Interestingly, there are two color photos showing the Ethiopian flags without emblems, both apparently 1:2.
Jan Zrzavy, 8 March 2001

I visited Ethiopia a few months ago (a great country to visit despite the poverity), and I can confirm that the vast majority of national flags there are flown without the blue disk and star in the middle. However, the blue disk and star appears on many gov