The white shape in the center of Laos’s national flag is a disc.
The Lao flag consists of three horizontal stripes: red, blue and red, with the blue middle stripe twice the height of either red stripe. A white disc sits in the center. The flag’s proportions are 2:3, and the disc’s diameter equals the height of the blue stripe in the standard design.
The present flag was first adopted in 1945 by the Lao Issara movement and was re-adopted as the national flag on 2 December 1975, when the Lao People’s Democratic Republic was established. Its designer was Maha Sila Viravong, a Lao scholar and cultural figure. The white disc is commonly explained as the moon over the Mekong River and, according to Viravong, as a symbol of Lao unity and hoped-for reunification across the river.
The flag is sometimes confused with other red-blue-white designs, but its central emblem is neither a star nor a crescent. The red stripes represent sacrifices in the struggle for independence, while blue is associated with the Mekong and national prosperity.