This page is part of © FOTW Flags Of The World website

National Liberation Front of Kurdistan

Eniya Rizgariya Netewa Kurdistan (ERNK)

Last modified: 2020-07-31 by ian macdonald
Keywords: kurdistan | turkey | national liberation front of kurdistan | eniya rizgariya netewa kurdistan | star (red) |
Links: FOTW homepage | search | disclaimer and copyright | write us | mirrors



[ERNK Flag] image by Fabio Berton


See also:

Description of the flag

The Flag of the ERNK (Eniya Rizgariya Netewa Kurdistan), a military organization linked to the PKK, is red with a green-bordered yellow circle and a five-pointed red star inside the circle.
Giuseppe Bottasini & Jacob Zhu, 25 May 1998

ENRK was formed in 1985 and disbanded earlier in 2000 after the 7th PKK Congress. The flag of the organisation will presumably no longer be seen in public, except as an historic artifact. This flag was much more commonly seen than the PKK party flag, and has apparently achieved the status of flag of Anatolian Kurdistan (and almost certainly would be the national flag if the PKK achieved any sort of independence for the region).
T. F. Mills, 27 September 1997 & 10 July 2000

This flag appears in the Flags of Aspirant Peoples chart [eba94], #32, with the following caption:

KURDISTAN
National Liberation Front of Kurdistan, ERNK
North Middle-East
Ivan Sache, 13 September 1999

The flag that has been called the flag of the National Liberation Front of Kurdistan has been the flag of the PKK since 2005.
Ivan Sache, 29 August 2010


Variants of the flag

[ERNK Flag]
image by Santiago Dotor

In the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth of today there is an item about the Turkish-Syrian conflict. In the item there is a picture of PKK leader on the background of the ERNK flag. The flag is a red field with a roundel in its center. The roundel consists of a soviet-like red star on yellow background, bordered in green. There is a very thin black pencil circle around the roundel. The roundel takes 1/2 of the flag width (1/4 red, 1/2 roundel,1/4 red). The width of the green circle is 1:30 of the flag width. The top of the rays are 1:90 of the width off the green circle (1:90 of the width). The flag is not shown to its full length but it looks like 1:2.
Dov Gutterman, 22 October 1998

At a protest march in Trondheim today, I saw a flag I didn't recognize, but I suspect that it might have some connection to Kurdish groups in Iraq. Mostly because of its similarity to the flag of ERNK, which was carried right beside it, along with the flag of PKK. This flag was as far as I could tell exactly the same as that of ERNK, except that the colors were reversed. It had a yellow field, instead of a red one. Unfortunately, I can't remember if the emblem in the middle had the same or different colours from the other flag, but at least, there was only red, yellow and green in it. Can anyone deny/confirm that this is a variant of the flag of ERNK?
Arnt Richard Johansen, 15 February 2003

[ERNK Flag]
image by Ivan Sache, 21 March 2012

A photo published in the "Tottenham & Wood Green Journal", 19 March 2012, shows a square version of the flag - erroneously labelled the PKK's flag.
Ivan Sache, 21 March 2012

[ERNK Flag]
image by James Dignan, 01 October 2013

News reports of pro-Turkish demonstrations in Turkey have been showing a flag I haven't seen before... is this a flag for Kurds in general, Kurds in Turkey, or some political party?
James Dignan, 01 October 2013

[ERNK Flag]
image by Ivan Sache, 07 April 2016

Yet another variant of the flag has the emblem covering the whole width of the flag.
Photo: http://www.franceinfo.fr/emission/expliquez-nous/2015-ete/expliquez-nous-le-pkk-27-07-2015-07-20
Ivan Sache, 07 April 2016