Historical area of Central Asia extending from the Caspian Sea in the west to the Gobi desert in the east. It is now divided among Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan (Northeast province), and China (part of Xinjiang Uygur province). It formerly covered an area of some 2,600,000 sq km/1,003,680 sq mi; its principal cities were Tashkent, Samarkand, and Bukhara.
Initially the sun and moon had human faces, but they were removed when the flag was updated in 1962. The flag is said to express the hope that Nepal will endure as long as the sun and the moon. The blue border symbolizes peace. Effective date: 16 December 1962.