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Kökbayraq

The Kökbayraq (lit. 'sky flag') is a flag used to represent the geographical region of East Turkestan in Central Asia. The flag was originally used as the national flag of the short-lived breakaway state known as the First East Turkestan Republic (1933–1934). The Kökbayraq has a white crescent (young waning moon) with a five pointed star on blue background, it was adopted on 12 November 1933 as the national flag of the First East Turkestan Republic during Declaration of independence. With the exception of the blue background, the flag is identical to the Flag of Turkey.

As of 2024, the public display of the Kökbayraq flag is illegal by the Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China. Uyghurs and other East Turkistanis in the diaspora fly the flag as their ethnic flag.

Usage

In modern times it is popularly used as a symbol of the East Turkestan independence movement and is claimed by the East Turkistan Government in Exile to be the national flag of an independent East Turkestan.

The light blue colour (background) is taken from the colour of the sky and is a predominant colour in Turkic culture that represents the sky, essentially the blue represents Turkic peoples. The crescent represents the notion of being victorious (un-defeatable) and is not necessarily an Islamic symbol, in-fact it was the Turks that introduced the crescent into the Islamic world. The star represents the Turkic nation, and is also found on the flag of the White Hun (Hephthalite) Empire and various other Turkic empires and states.