Program and Event

National POW/MIA Recognition Day

U.S. Ambassador Ravic Huso and Detachment Commander Maj.Edward Nevgloski, and members of the JPAC team listen to the US National Anthem during the ceremony

The United States Ambassador to Laos, Ravic R. Huso, hosted a ceremony in honor of the United States National POW/MIA Recognition Day on Friday the 18th of September at the Ambassador's residence. The ceremony was held in remembrance of the Prisoners of War and those still Missing in Action from past American conflicts and to recognize the strong United States and Lao PDR cooperation to account for and recover those service members who never returned home. Representatives from the Lao PDR Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and from embassies of the Kingdom of Cambodia, Kingdom of Thailand, and Socialist Republic of Vietnam, attended the event.

POW/MIA recognition day was established by the U.S. Congress in 1979 to honor America's POW/MIAs, those returned and those still missing and unaccounted for from our nation's wars. The observance of National POW/MIA day is one of six days throughout the year that the U.S. Congress has mandated the flying of the National League of Families' POW/MIA flag. The POW/MIA flag was created in 1971 by the National League of Families, and historians and flag experts call the proliferation of the POW/MIA flag unprecedented in the history of the United States and perhaps the world. The flag first flew over the White House in 1988 and was installed in the Capitol Rotunda in 1989, making it the only flag ever permanently displayed there, according to flag experts. In 1990, Congress adopted the flag as "the symbol of our nation's concern and commitment to resolving as fully as possible the fates of Americans still prisoner, missing and unaccounted for in Southeast Asia."