A remote European country nearly 3,000 miles from Britain has claimed to have become a record-breaker by constructing the world’s tallest flagpole.
Azerbaijan has most recently been in the news for the COP29 climate summit attended by Britain’s Sir Keir Starmer and not many other major world leaders.
But the country’s capital, Baku, is now home to a flagpole carrying Azerbaijan’s colours, which stands at the dizzying height of 650 metres.
To put the size of the feat into perspective, the flag is now flying in the country’s State Flag Square at a height more than double that of Big Ben.
And it’s not just the pole which might be a record holder, as local English language news site Azernews reports the 500kg red, blue and green national flag is also the biggest on the planet.
It said the flag has a “width of 36 metres (118 feet) and a length of 72 metres (236 feet)”.
Construction magazine site Heavy Lift and Project Forwarding International reports Turkish firm Hareket built the enormous pole, which holds the super-massive flag.
Posting on their LinkedIn page, Hareket declared earlier this month: “The transport and mechanical assembly of the world’s tallest flagpole, standing at 200 metres and weighing a total of 1,300 tonnes, were successfully completed by Hareket.
“The transport and assembly processes of this colossal structure, with its largest component weighing 234 tonnes, were carried out under the leadership of our expert team, utilizing innovative solutions and precise engineering techniques.
“Challenges encountered throughout the project were overcome with our team’s expertise, bringing the project to a successful conclusion.”
Former Soviet state Azerbaijan has been independent since 1991 and has a population of around 10 million people in a country, approximately a third of the size of the UK.
The country enjoys large natural reserves of oil and gas, which led the President Ilham Aliyev to declare at the COP29 climate summit in November that these were a “gift of God”.