North Korea Women's Soccer Team in Wrong-Flag Protest (Photo)

North Korean Women's Soccer Team Refuses to Play after Flag Screw-Up

The initial rumor was that the North Korean women's soccer team refused to play their first Olympic match because a South Korean flag was displayed at the stadium. That's not quite what happened.

Actually, it's a bit more embarrassing for LOCOG. Scotland's Hampden Park showed the South Korean flag (instead of the couldn't-be-more-different PRK flag) when introducing North Korean team. The result was that the PRK team refused to take the field.

Photos

South Korea Flag Used for North Korea at Olympic Match

see larger image

uploaded by NowPublic Staff

An hour later, they emerged. The Colombia-North Korea game is still underway as we post this; the current score is PRK 2-0 Colombia.

• Live Score: North Korea-Colombia (Olympic Women's Soccer)
  

LOCOG was forced to apologize: "Clearly that is a mistake. We will apologize to the team and the National Olympic Committee and steps will be taken to ensure this does not happen again." We humbly recommend bookmarking this handy-dandy Flags of the World index.

[Update: the final result of the match was North Korea 2-0 Colombia.]