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| Iraq |
| New Iraqi flag hailed as symbolic break with past |
| 2008-02-06 |
| Iraq's controversial new flag, shorn of its perceived Ba'athist associations, was raised over parliament in Baghdad for the first time yesterday in what Iraqi leaders hailed as a symbolic break with the past. It is the country's seventh flag in eight decades. The current design is temporary and will fly over state buildings and institutions throughout the country for one year. Then Iraqi MPs will debate the colours of a new and potentially permanent standard. The new flag is similar to the old one. The red, white and black horizontal stripes stay, but three green stars in the centre representing unity, freedom and socialism, the Ba'athists' motto, have gone. The phrase Allahu Akbar (God is greatest), added in green Arabic script on Saddam Hussein's orders during the 1991 Gulf war, remains, but since his downfall it has no longer been in his handwriting. Last month the National Assembly agreed to adopt the new flag in a move to head off potential embarrassment at a summit of Arab legislators in the Kurdish regional capital, Irbil, later this month. Massoud Barzani, president of the self-rule Kurdistan region, has ordered that only the Kurdish flag should fly in areas under Kurdish control. Kurds say the old Iraqi banner is a reminder of the attempted genocide against them by the former Ba'athist regime. They want the Iraqi flag to include yellow, which features in the centre of their flag in the form of a blazing sun. However, a new design could not be agreed in time for the Irbil conference and so the temporary flag was chosen. The new national colours have met with a lukewarm response from many Arabs, including the prime minister Nuri al Maliki. At a ceremony to hoist the new flag above the cabinet building inside the Green Zone, Maliki said that he believed the flag "could have been changed in a better form but it was voted for by parliament, and we have to commit ourselves to it". |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #1 |
| Posted by: RD 2008-02-06 01:39 |