Azerbaijan. Ganja region. Ganja. A young man walks on the sidewalk. A red Lada car, used as a taxi, drives on the concrete road. Both are passing near a huge advertising memorial with a map and the flag of Azerbaijan and a picture of the deceased political leader Heydar Aliyev ( May 10, 1923 - December 12, 2003), also spelled as Heidar Aliev, Geidar Aliev, Haydar Aliyev. He was the president of Azerbaijan for the New Azerbaijan Party from June 1993 to October 2003. The flag of Azerbaijan is a national symbol and consists of three equal horizontal bands, blue, red, and green; a white crescent and an eight-pointed star (Rub El Hizb) are centered in the red band. The eight points of the star stand for the eight branches of the Turkic people. The blue band is the color of the Turks, the green is for Islam and red is for progress. © 2007 Didier Ruef