Flagman’s world of flags

 A competition to design a flag for Gloucestershire to celebrate the county’s millennium year has been launched. The new High Sheriff, Jonathan Carr, is offering £250 to the winner.

Historians at an inquiry in Shire Hall last year concluded the county was established in 1007.

Mr Carr said the competition was a good idea in the millennium year, especially as other counties in the region already have their own flags.

A calendar of events promoting the county’s culture and heritage has been organised for the millennium year, and residents are being invited to organise their own.

Entries close on 1 March 2008.

Here

Have  a great day Australia!

We have the flags of all six nations, England, Italy, France, Scotland, Ireland and Wales  in this great pack available here

Considering he was executed ssome time ago it is probably about time.

From AFP

BAGHDAD (AFP) — Saddam Hussein’s handwritten praise to God will be dropped from the Iraqi flag and the symbolism behind its three green stars will be changed, according to a bill presented to parliament on Saturday.

The Iraqi flag still bears the ousted dictator’s handwritten Allahu Akhbar” (God is Greater) while the three stars officially symbolise unity, freedom and socialism — the slogan of Saddam’s Baath party.

Under the new flag law, given its first reading by parliament on Saturday, the praise to God will be printed — in yellow — in the Kufi form of Arabic script while the stars will now represent peace, tolerance and justice.

“The Iraqi parliament read the Iraqi flag law for the first time in its session on Saturday,” said Naseer al-Isawi, a Sadrist lawmaker.

“The law will be applied following the second reading in four days’ time,” he added.

The new law would apply for a year, after which it would be looked at again, he added.

Saddam was toppled by the US-led invasion of 2003. He was executed on December 30 2006 for crimes against humanity.

From AFP

MELBOURNE (AFP) — Indian tennis star Sania Mirza is considering her future after a furore in her country over a photograph that shows her bare feet resting near the national flag, a newspaper reported Friday.

The Australian newspaper reported that the image, taken by an AFP photographer at the Hopman Cup in Perth last week as Mirza was resting in a courtside box, had outraged ultra-nationalists in her homeland.

The newspaper said a complaint had been filed in the Hyderabad High Court demanding action under India’s Prevention of Insult to the National Honour Act, which can carry a three-year jail term.

Mirza, India’s number one player and a huge star in her homeland, has previously ran afoul of Muslim fundamentalists for wearing short skirts and sleeveless tops on court.

Her manager Mahesh Bhupathi described the latest controversy as “ridiculous” and said it was affecting the world number 31, who has been seeded at next week’s Australian Open for the first time.

“She is very upset, it’s a major issue for her,” Bhupathi told the Australian.

“At the end of the day, she is a 21-year-old girl trying to do her best by everyone,” Bhupathi said. “Everything is adding up and she is starting to wonder whether it is all worth it, but people close to her, they are telling her to hang in there.”

In New Delhi, the All India Tennis Association (AITA) deplored the controversy.

“It is unfortunate that a photograph taken during the Hopman Cup has created serious misunderstanding in the minds of the people, who are taking this issue too far,” AITA secretary-general Anil Khanna said in a statement.

“Such situations are affecting her performance and will surely have an influence on her achieving high ranking positions to qualify for the Olympics both in and singles and doubles.”

Mirza has been seeded 31 in the season-opening Grand Slam and faces Iroda Tulyaganova of Uzbekistan in the first round.

She suffered a range of injuries last year, including wrist and abdominal problems, and surgery on her right knee in March but recently said she was back to her best and expected to resume her climb up the rankings in 2008.

The Indian flag

 From Pravda

WWII veteran Mikhail Minin, a Hero of the Soviet Union, the man, who raised the USSR flag, the banner of Victory, over Germany’s Reichstag in May of 1945, died.

Minin will be buried on January 12 in his native city of Pskov where he resided until then, Interfax report.

Mikhail Minin was born in the village of Vanino in 1922. In June of 1941 he volunteered to join the army to fight against Nazi Germany. He took part in battles to liberate Leningrad from blockade and made his way across the fronts from Leningrad to Berlin.

When the Soviet army was storming Reichstag in Berlin on April 30, 1945 Minin broke into the building and became the first man to raise the Red Banner on its tower. In May of 1945 Minin was awarded the title of the Soviet Union Hero for his deed and other services in battle. The famous photo does not show Minin but a Georgian soldier. It was not taken at the actual event.

Josef Stalin had urged his troops to mount the flag on the Reichstag building no later than May 1, 1945. Minin’s superiors had told the soldiers that any piece of red cloth fixed to the building would symbolize that the battle was won.

Minin was part of a team of five soldiers who brought a red flag and tried to enter the building. They found most doors to be replaced by concrete and one door that was locked. The members of the group recalled seeing a tree limb nearby. Using the limb they managed to break the locked door by force. As they entered there was sporadic fire from German soldiers. They responded with their machine guns and managed to go up the stairs and reach the roof. Once there they decided to attach the flag to the large statue Germania over the entrance. At first they did not manage to fix the flag at a good place. Someone noticed that the person sitting on the statue was wearing a crown. They climbed the statue and managed to insert a metal pole with the flag inside the crown. They then used belts from their trousers to fix the flag at its location.

Minin was recognized for his feat, but was not really rewarded. As there were no photos taken when the flag was put on the roof on 10 p.m., other photos were taken on other occasions of which the one above has become most famous.

When the Great Patriotic War ended, Minin continued his army service. In 1959 he graduated from the Military Academy and joined special strategic purpose troops. Minin moved to Pskov in 1977 and decided to stay in the city afterwards.

This iconic image was actually doctored to hide the fact that he was wearing two watches, obvious evidence of looting.

You can but the Soviet flag here

We now have a wide selection of high quality Union jacks up to 12 feet in length!

See here for details

 From the Alberta Globe and mail, unfortunately no picture of the flag

LETHBRIDGE, Alta. — Dennis Coburn was expecting the usual spiders, cobwebs, old books and newspapers when he was cleaning out a cupboard at a Royal Canadian Legion office a couple of weeks ago.

What he didn’t anticipate was finding a large flag emblazoned with a swastika.

Mr. Coburn, president of the Lethbridge legion, was helping clean the manager’s office when he came across a plastic bag. A cursory look inside revealed a photo of a soldier and some folded material.

“I could see it was some kind of a flag,” Mr. Coburn said this week.

He didn’t think much of it at the time, but as he drove home he considered the bag and its contents and assumed the flag might be the Union Jack. On further reflection, however, he recalled seeing black on the flag, a colour not found on the Union Jack.

When he arrived home, he unfolded the flag and discovered it was not what he was expecting. In addition to the giant Nazi symbol that unfolded before him, the flag was signed by Canadian soldiers from the 2nd Anti-Tank Regiment that fought in Normandy in the Second World War. It lists various battles and the soldiers killed in action. A Lethbridge soldier also signed his name, although it is hard to read.

Mr. Coburn realized he had found more than just a flag. “The hair stood up on the back of my neck.”

Lethbridge’s 18th Air Defence Regiment — although it wasn’t known as such back then — formed part of the anti-tank unit during the war. And that’s where the flag was returned Tuesday during an official ceremony in which it was unveiled to the surprise of active and retired soldiers and their families.

“This is a very important piece of our history,” said commanding officer Dan Beauchamp.

The flag was signed May 8, 1945, the day of the war’s European ceasefire. Mr. Coburn said it was mailed to the legion in 1995 by a Mrs. Osler, the wife of Sgt. William Osler, who is in the photo discovered with the flag.

“It captures a moment in time,” said Glenn Miller, a member of the legion executive and recently retired from the 18th Air Defence Regiment. “It tells a story from when they first landed, throughout their campaign to the last day.”

Mr. Beauchamp said the flag will probably be displayed in a museum located within the 18th Air Defence armoury at the Lethbridge County Airport.