Pan-African Flag | Black Student Center - afro american flag

 2024-08-17 21:56:06

The Two-Spirit Pride Flag represents Indigenous American that identity as two-spirit individuals meaning they fall outside of the M-F binary. The feathers represent masculine and feminine identities. The circle signifies the unification of both identities into a separate gender while the rainbow represents modern queer identities.

A decomposed human hand with the remains of flesh, bleak and brown save for one splash of color — two thin blue-yellow rubber bracelets. The colors of the Ukrainian national flag.

The Bisexual Flag was created in 1998 by Michael Page to bring awareness o the bisexual community. The pink represents bisexual’s attraction to the same gender while the blue represents the attraction to the opposite gender. The purple stripe in the middle represents attraction to two genders.

"He said, 'Guys, I think I’m 300’,” he recalled his comrade saying, using the military code for “wounded.” “We checked, cut off his clothes, and saw his knee and elbow were shot."

"We should have pulled back because we had nothing to fight with,” he recalls. “I managed to fire one magazine, then there was smoke, a grenade, a bang — and that was the end of my war."

The Russian troops were approaching the dugout. Zarudny said he didn’t want to get captured and recalled one of his comrades echoing him.

As practice shows, taking or not taking a prisoner in battle depends on various factors, said a 47-year-old major of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, who we identify only by his callsign "Karay" because he has no official permission to comment on the issue. “Karay” has witnessed many acts of cruelty during his 10-year service in the war in Ukraine in various brigades.

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The Russian soldiers took the other two soldiers as prisoners. Zarudny was released in a prisoner exchange a year and a half later, in January 2024. The second soldier is still officially listed as a prisoner. As for the third one, he is formally listed as missing.

"During the battle, the Russians killed two of our guys. Two more survived. When the Russians entered, our guys raised their hands, but the Russians killed them," said one of the eyewitnesses who saw what happened that day during a live broadcast from a drone.

Many assumed that the man, soon identified as a Ukrainian soldier Serhii Sova, was killed in battle. Only one person knew that the truth was more grim.

The Queer People of Color Flag appeared at San Francisco Pride in 2019, but rose to prominence in 2020 during the Black Lives Matter Protests. While the designer and original year are unknown, the flag signifies how the struggle for racial equality and queer equality often intersect. It also honors the number of QPOC that have spent their lives fighting for both queer and racial equity.

"Seventeen years of our life together. These were the best years of my life, and I am very grateful he was my husband. He loved us very much; we were everything to him, and he spent all his free time with the family."

"In some units, according to radio intercepts, Russian commanders practice involving their soldiers in executions, including with demonstrative brutality, to bind the "team" with blood and crimes so that the soldiers will fight to the last and not surrender to the Ukrainians,” “Karay” said.

"Prisoners can be executed because of the desire to take revenge for fellow servants, or when a group cannot or does not want to spend time on guarding and evacuating prisoners, so they kill them.” At the same time, the higher the status of the unit, like Russian marines or paratroopers, the higher the probability that the prisoners will remain alive, “Karay” said. “There is a higher percentage of professional soldiers. For them, war is work, and they avoid emotions.”

The creation of the Bigender Pride Flag is unknown. The flag represents those who have two genders. In some cases, this is both male and female, but it can also include non-binary identities. These two gender identities can occur at the same time or they can vary over time.

The Genderqueer Pride Flag was created by Marilyn Roxie in 2011 to represent those people that reject the static categories of gender. Genderqueer people may see themselves as both or neither male and female or beyond the binary. The lavender stripe represents androgyny and other queer identities while the white stripe stands for agender people. The green stripe symbolizes those who fall outside of the binary.

While this flag is not as well known, this is the Queer Pride Flag. Created in 2015, the flag represents all aspects of queerness as the label ‘queer’ has become more celebrated. The pink and blue shades represented same-gender attraction while the orange and green stripes stand for non-binary and gender non-confirming individuals. The black and white stripes symbolize asexual, aromantic, and the agender community.

Scrolling through Telegram channels, Oksana came upon familiar features. In the photo, her husband was stripped down to the waist, his hands tied behind his back. In the back of his head, a gaping gunshot wound.

“The Russians drove in there with tanks and armored personnel carriers and started destroying everything in sight,” he says, adding that he knows of only two men who were taken captive that day. “Everyone else who was there died. There were about 40 people. This all happened in about four hours."

Thanks to photographic evidence, which the Russians published on Telegram channels, it became clear that Serhii survived that heavy battle and even remained unharmed, but was executed by Russian soldiers. According to the Kyiv Independent’s sources in Serhii’s unit, the 93rd Brigade, the Russian troops that were stationed in the area were from the 4th Tank Kantemirovskaya Division.

The Genderfluid Pride Flag was developed in 2013 by JJ Poole to give space to those whose gender identity and/or gender expression fluctuates during different times and different circumstances. Each color represents a different aspect of the Genderfluid community: pink stands for femininity, while blue stands for masculinity, white represents the lack of gender while black symbolizes all genders, the purple stripe represents a combination of masculinity and femininity.

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On the other hand, there are some Russian units, such as the “Rusich” Sabotage-Assault Reconnaissance Group,” which publicly declares that they do not take prisoners. They were the ones who published the video featuring the cutting off of the head of a Ukrainian soldier.

Many testimonies of executions of prisoners on the battlefield in this war have been captured by aerial footage. The Kyiv Independent obtained a video, according to our sources inside the brigade, dated Feb. 18, 2024, shot in the trenches between the villages of Robotyne and Verbove in Zaporizhzhia Oblast. It shows two unarmed soldiers of the 82nd Separate Air Assault Brigade walking near the trenches before being shot by an automatic firearm moments later.

It is unknown when the Demisexual Pride Flag was created, but it represents people who only form sexual attraction for people once they have established a deep emotional connection with them. Each color has a different meaning: black represents asexuality, gray stands for demisexuality, white means sexuality, while purple represents community.

Oksana has never shared the story of how she found out what happened to her husband until now. Nor has she discussed what she experienced in the days since she learned that he had gone missing.

The details around the creation of the Demigender Pride Flag are unknown. The flag represents those people who have a partial feeling, but not a full connection, to a particular gender identity or to the concept of gender.

"Every single day, I was checking Russian Telegram channels, looking for prisoners, the dead, everyone,” she recalls. “After a month, in May, I found what I was looking for.”

The Transgender Pride Flag debuted at Phoenix Pride in 2000 and was created by US Navy Veteran Monica Helms. She created the flag as a symbol of both the diversity of the trans community and the rights that trans folks are fighting for today. The blue stripes represent the ‘traditional boy’ colors while the pink stripes represent the ‘traditional girl’ colors. The white stripes represents those who are intersex, transitioning, or have an undefined gender. Check out a Tik Tok on the history of the Trans Flag!

The Asexual Pride Flag was created in 2010 following a contest by the Asexual Visibility and Education Network. Asexual individuals are people that do not have a sexual attraction to any gender. Each stripe has a different meaning: black represents asexuality, gray means gray-asexuality & demisexuality, whites stands for non-asexual partners and allies, and the purple represents community.

Prisoners of war (POW) are granted protection under international humanitarian law, namely the 4th Hague Convention on the Laws and Customs of War adopted in 1907. According to the convention, killing a POW constitutes a war crime, and a soldier is considered a POW and cannot be attacked from the moment he lays down his weapon or no longer possesses the means of protection, voluntarily surrenders, or demonstrates such an intention. This also applies to those who find themselves under the power of the enemy, rendered defenseless by unconsciousness, injury, or illness.

Months earlier, Sova’s widow saw the photos of her dead husband on Russian Telegram channels. The photos showed he had been shot in the head, his hands tied behind his back. All signs pointed to the fact that he had been executed while in Russian captivity. Still, when his body was found near Izium, it hit her again.

The Nonbinary Pride Flag was created in 2014 to represent those individuals who do not identify with either binary gender or within the binary at all. The yellow stripe represents a gender outside of the binary. The white stripe stands for those who have multiple or all genders. The purple stripe symbolizes those who fall between the male/female binary. The black stripe represents those with no gender.

The Pride of Africa debuted at Johannesburg Pride in 2019. It was created by Pride of Africa Foundation. This is the first pan-African LGBTQ+ flag. It is inspired by the flags of all the countries in Africa.

“My heart and everything inside me sank,” Oksana Sova says, recalling the moment she saw the photos in the media and recognized the bracelet and tattoos on her husband’s body.

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The Progress Pride Flag evolved from the Philadelphia Pride Flag and was created by Daniel Quaser. Quasar added a white, pink, and light blue stripe to represent the Trans community. While the black and brown stripes still represented communities of color, the black stripe is also a nod the thousands of individuals that the community lost during the HIV/AIDS crisis in 1980s and 1990s. Since its creation, the flag has become very popular.

By clicking "GO" below, you will be directed to a website operated by the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, an independent 501(c)(3) entity.

In 2021, over 30,000 members of the polyamorous community voted for this new Polyamory Pride Flag design by Red Howell, which created a contemporary approach to the traditional vexillological elements of the original flag from 1995, and represents elements around different core values including white for possibility, magenta for desire and love, blue for openness and honesty, gold for energy and perseverance and purple representing the united non-monogamous community.

The Russian fire subsided as their infantry fighting vehicles moved deeper into the village. The soldiers removed the wounded soldier's body armor, bandaged him, and considered their next move. It was too late to retreat.

But after a brief discussion, they decided to surrender. Zarudny recalls that a Russian soldier saw the grenade in his hand, warned him not to use it, and took it away.

The Polysexual Pride Flag was created online in 2012 for people that are attracted to multiple, yet not all, gender. The blue stripe represents attraction to men, pink stands for the attraction to women, while green is for attraction to those outside of the binary.

"A Russian soldier looked at him, cocked his Kalashnikov, and fired two shots at him,” Zarudny recalled. “Then, he said: 'Don't take it the wrong way. His legs were shattered. I did it so he wouldn't suffer. He’s better off this way’."

It’s impossible to know how many Ukrainian soldiers have been executed after being taken captive. Recording and investigating such crimes is extremely difficult due to limited access. Since the start of the full-scale invasion in 2022, the United Nations has documented the execution of 42 Ukrainian service members. Ukraine has documented 102 such executions as of October 2022. The actual figure could be much higher.

In September 2022, after the liberation of Kharkiv Oblast, a large burial site was found in the forest near the city of Izium — the bodies of Ukrainian soldiers and civilians, killed by Russians. Soon after, Ukrainian authorities began their exhumation.

Videos and photos of brutal executions have been appearing online more frequently since the spring of 2023. In March 2023, a video was published on Telegram showing Russian soldiers shooting a captive Ukrainian soldier after he said "Glory to Ukraine." Only a month later, a different video showed Russian soldiers cutting off the head of a Ukrainian soldier as he screamed in pain. At the end of the video, a Russian soldier holds up the severed head.

Roman Zarudny, callsign “Irishman,” a soldier from the National Guard of Ukraine, was at the outpost that was among the first to be attacked. A 32-year-old former circus artist who voluntarily joined the military at the beginning of the full-scale invasion, he had been fighting for less than three months at the time of the assault.

The original Pride Flag was created in 1978 after activist Harvey Milk asked artist Gilbert Baker to design a symbol of gay pride. Each color represents a different part of the LGBTQ+ community: hot pink represents sex, red symbolizes life, orange stands for healing, yellow equals sunlight, green stands for nature, turquoise symbolizes magic and art, indigo represents serenity, while violet symbolizes the spirit of LGBTQ+ people.

There could be no mistake in identifying him: The photo showed the soldier's face and recognizable tattoos on his torso — an owl, a samurai, and a sakura. Near Serhii was at least one more dead man, his hands tied behind his back and a t-shirt pulled over his head.

Oksana Sova from Nikopol, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, recognized her husband, 35-year-old serviceman Serhii Sova, in the photographs.

For Oksana, establishing the truth about what really happened to her loved one and remembering him in a dignified way is vital. Oksana and Serhii had been together for 17 years. They ran a dog training business together. He was a boxer and had served in the Ukrainian army before. He left behind two children: a son, Marat, now 16, and a daughter, Elina, who is 11.

The circumstances of the battle during which Serhii was captured are recounted by his comrades, who managed to retreat in time. In April 2022, the 3rd Company of the 1st Battalion of the 93rd Brigade was holding positions in tree lines near the villages of Sulyhivka, Dibrivne, and Nova Dmytrivka in the Izium district of Kharkiv Oblast. This location is about 50 kilometers from where Serhii’s body would be found in September.

What happened to his body is unknown, and his family is still searching for him, hoping for the best. Soldiers from the Kulchytsky Battalion, who fought alongside Zarudny’s brigade on June 1, 2022, confirmed the dramatic turn of events that day, unfavorable for Ukrainian forces.

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The Kyiv Independent has collected testimonies about three executions of Ukrainian soldiers by Russian troops. We received photo evidence of the crimes, which the Russian soldiers themselves distributed on Telegram channels shortly after the execution, a unique video shot from a drone by Ukrainian military officers, and spoke with an eyewitness to an execution who was captured, survived abuse in captivity, and returned to Ukraine. These are their stories.

On June 1, 2022, in Donetsk Oblast, near the village of Yarova, at dawn, Russian artillery fired intensely in preparation for an assault on Ukrainian positions. Next, the tanks rolled in.

"We held the defense there for about two weeks and tried to break through. On April 19, at 2 a.m., we received the order to retreat because we were being encircled. We moved back to another tree line,” recalls Yurii, callsign "Pavuk," who was at that time a squad commander of the 3rd Company, 3rd Platoon, 1st Battalion of the 93rd Brigade.

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Executions on a battlefield remain among the least documented deaths in war. This crime extremely rarely leaves witnesses. Units of such cases fall into the lenses of drones or are recorded by the killers.

After the assassination of Harvey Milk, the rainbow flag was in high demand. Due to manufacturing issues, the hot pink stripe was removed. The turquoise stripe was removed from the flag as a design choice from Baker. The six color pride flag has represented the community for over 40 years and is still one of the most common LGBTQ+ flags.

Even for the cases that have been recorded, justice appears to be a doubtful prospect. Russia doesn’t recognize or investigate POW execution cases. In Ukraine, the Prosecutor General’s Office has opened 27 investigations into the killing of POWs. So far, only three cases have made it to court, only one of which is being considered in the presence of a Russian soldier and two in absentia. No verdicts have been made yet.

The photographs documenting this war crime were later deleted from the Russian Telegram channels, which they had posted along with other photos of captured and executed Ukrainian soldiers with a call urging Ukrainians to surrender in order to survive. Oksana also later deleted the photos from her phone, fearing that her two children would accidentally find them. However, friends of Serhii saved screenshots of the posts and shared them with the Kyiv Independent.

“In the photo, he was very thin — my husband was never that thin. I kept looking... It was tough in the first days. I noticed that these bastards had taken everything. There were no silver chains with the pendants I had given him, no belt, no boots."

The Pansexual Pride Flag was created around 2010 in order to bring awareness to the community. Pansexual people are those who have the potential for emotional, romantic, or sexual attraction to people of any gender though not necessarily at the same time, in the same way or to the same degree. The pink stripe represents attraction to women while the blue stripe represents attraction to men. The yellow stripe is for everyone else in-between and beyond the gender binary.

This is the second version of the Gay Men’s Pride Flag. The original only had green, blue and white. This version has different shades of green and blue to include non-cisgender gay men.

While there have been many iterations of the Lesbian Pride Flag, this has been in use since 2018. Since then, it has been widely accepted. The different shades of red, pink, and orange represent the different types of femininity in the lesbian community.

The Agender Pride Flag was created in 2014 to represent those who have an unidentifiable gender, are gender neutral, or have no gender. The black and white stripes represent the absence of gender while the gray stripes stand for semi-genderless people. The green stripe represents non-binary people.

The Intersex-Inclusive Progress Pride Flag adds the intersex community to the Progress Pride Flag. With this update coming in 2021, this serves as the most up-to-date LGBTQ+ flag. The flag was created by Valentino Vecchietti of Intersex Equality Rights UK.

Cases of executions of Ukrainian prisoners of war by Russian soldiers have spiked since 2023. As executions of soldiers remain among the least documented deaths in war, we publish testimonies about three such cases.

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This story is one vivid example of a recently increasing number of public reports of executions of Ukrainian soldiers by Russian forces. According to Ukraine’s Prosecutor General's Office, cases of executions of Ukraine’s soldiers began to surge in 2023.

The Philadelphia Pride Flag was unveiled at the city’s pride event in 2017. The Philadelphia City Council commissioned the creation of this flag as they wanted to incorporate queer communities of color that have often been overlooked in the mainstream LGBTQ+ movement. The addition of the black and brown stripes symbolize communities of color and their contribution to the movement.

He remembers how the company was repositioning from 2 a.m. to 6 a.m., when Russian troops saw it and brazenly advanced. Artillery was hitting them from all sides, causing them to scatter before the enemy tanks arrived. Serhii’s position was about 100 meters from Yurii, closer to the road.

The nature of the photo, the absence of clothes, the tied hands — all pointed to the fact that Russian soldiers had killed Serhii when he was already captured and should have been protected as a POW.

Cases like this continue to surface in 2024, often accompanied by horrendous videos. Some of them feature decapitation and mutilation of bodies.

The Intersex Pride Flag was developed in 2013 by the co-chair of Intersex Human Rights Australia, Morgan Carpenter. Intersex people are those born with a variety of differences in their sex traits and reproductive anatomy. There is no one way to be intersex as everyone’s experience in unique. The creator chose yellow and purple as those are seen as gender neutral colors.

In the LGBTQ+ community, we signify our pride with flags. With many different identities in the community, there comes many different flags to know. We have collected all of the flags and a guide to learn about all of the different colors of our community’s rainbow. We know that this may not be all of the flags that represent our community, but we will update the page as new flags become popular!

"This has been practiced in the Russian army since the (Second) Chechen War. And they did it very much in many conflicts in which they participated. I think that this is a specially organized practice, and it is aimed at two aspects," says Volodymyr Yavorskyi, program director of the Ukrainian Nobel Prize-winning Center for Civil Liberties. He believes that it’s all about spreading fear: firstly among people already on the front lines that they will most certainly die, so they should retreat. Secondly, among those who are expected to be mobilized. "A person sees this and thinks that mobilization is inevitable death,” he said.

One of the bodies exhumed drew the attention of the media on site: Its half-decomposed wrist carried a rubber bracelet in the colors of the Ukrainian national flag. The photo flew around the world.

The hand was from a body of the hundreds of victims of Russian troops, soldiers, and civilians, exhumed from a mass burial site near the then-just-liberated Izium, a city in Kharkiv Oblast, in September 2022. Captured by journalists, the photo spread worldwide and became a symbol of Russian violence and Ukrainian resistance.