Flag of Burkina Faso of black, white, and red. These colours represented the three major tributaries of the Volta River, which flows south through the country: the Black Volta, the White Volta and the Red Volta. It is similar to the tricolor flag used by the German Empire from 1871 to 1918. The flag was changed when Upper Volta became Burkina Faso on 4 August 1984. From 1984 until 1997, the official Burkina Faso coat of arms used a revolutionary central crest featuring a mattock crossed with a Soviet AK-47 assault rifle, along with an open book symbolising the importance of education and the
Lake Volta Lake Volta Lake Volta is the largest reservoir, man-made lake, in terms of surface area contained behind the Akosombo Dam. It is completely within the country of Ghana and has a surface area of . Stretching from Akosombo in the south to the northern part of the country, it is one of the largest man-made reservoirs in the world. Lake Volta lies along the Greenwich meridian, and just six degrees of latitude north of the Equator. The lake's northernmost point is close to the town of Yapei, and its southernmost extreme is at the Akosombo Dam, downstream from Yapei. Akosombo