Bosnia and Herzegovina Flag

How to identify it

A blue field with a yellow right-angled triangle along the top edge and a diagonal line of white stars running beside it, the stars at each end cut off by the edge.

Design and construction

Proportions

1:2

Adoption and legal status

Imposed by decree of the Office of the High Representative, Carlos Westendorp, in February 1998, after Bosnia's ethnic parties failed to agree on new post-war state symbols by the Dayton-mandated deadline.

Construction

A blue field with a yellow right-angled triangle along the top edge and a diagonal line of white five-pointed stars beside it, the end stars cut off by the flag's edges.

Officially documented meaning

The triangle is generally read as a geographic reference to Bosnia's roughly triangular shape and stands for the country's three constituent peoples (Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats); the blue field and yellow triangle echo the colours of the flag of the European Union.

History of the design

It replaced the 1992-1998 wartime flag, a white field with a shield of golden fleurs-de-lis from the medieval Kotromanić dynasty, which had come to be seen as representing only the Bosniak community and remains in unofficial use by some Bosniaks today.

Sources