The flag of Somalia was adopted on October 12, 1954. It was designed by Mohammed Awale Liban, and intended to be used to represent pan-Somali territories. Upon reunification of Italian Somaliland and British Somaliland, the flag was used for the Somali Democratic Republic.
The flag consists of a light blue field with a single white star in the center. The star is said to represent the five regions in the Horn of Africa that the Somali people inhabit: the Ogaden, the Northern Frontier District (NFD), Djibouti, and the former British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland. The light blue represents the Indian Ocean flanking Somalia. It is most similar to the flag of Vietnam, which is the same, except Vietnam’s flag is red and yellow, and the star in that flag is slightly bigger.
The blue colour of Somalia’s flag is taken from the flag of the United Nations, in honour of the United Nations’ role in Somalia gaining independence.