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Photo: Courtesy of Eurotic

The European Union flag has been having a bit of a micro fashion moment. At London Fashion Week Mens in January, British label Agi & Sam put the symbolic circle of 12 gold stars on a scarf and a jacket. For Vetementss Euro-centric Stereotypes collectionwhich brought together the Gabber culture of Rotterdam, Englands chavs, and the regions many touriststhere was a distressed sweater printed with the same design. Now, it has even prompted the emergence of Eurotic, a young, cult label that has turned the EU flag cameo into a direct political statement.

Agi & Sam Fall 2017 Menswear; Vetements Fall 2017 Menswear Photo: Indigital.tv

Started by photographer Lea Colombo and model Valter Trsleff, Eurotic recently launched its small line of hoodies, T-shirts, and sweatshirts. On its lo-fi website, described as Europes Unofficial Souvenir Store, there are two versions of the flag: the standard blue with gold stars and a red version titled Eurasia. According to Trsleff, Eurotic is a direct reaction to Brexit, the United Kingdoms controversial decision to leave the EU. For us, the European Union has always stood for openness and togetherness across our bordersthe feeling of being united and open is something that our imagery tries to portray, he says. Growing up in the European Union and the freedom of movement that it has given me, I found it strange that people were repelling something that has been a guarantee for peace and stability for the last couple of generations.

The flag trend was sparked by a European Union in crisis, not unlike the way Americana swept the New York Fall 2017 runways in response to the U.S.s own political backdrop. The fallout from Brexit shed light on the growing nationalist sentiment in countries like France, where current presidential candidate Marine Le Pen is running on the platform to abandon the EU. It doesnt stop there: Politicians in Finland are reportedly pushing their own Brexit, known as Fixit, while earlier this year, Dutch far-right politician Geert Wilders (who draws comparisons to President Donald Trump in both looks and agenda) also voiced a desire to leave the Union. Of late, the call to exit has dominated the narrative, but there is also strong opposition. Back in March, pro-EU demonstrations took place in more than 40 cities. And what were some of those participants wearing? Nothing less than the EU flag.

Photo: Courtesy of Lea Colombo for Eurotic

Though it may be hard to tell whether a protester is wearing a Eurotic tee or a two-dollar piece from a souvenir shop, the label has found a way to stand out and resonate with young people through its smart digital presence . Theyve mastered a tongue-in-cheek Eurotrash flare that attracts oddball fans like model Sasha Melnychuk. Eurotics Instagram, @eurotic_ , is bizarre and funny: Think screen grabs of late night hotline commercials, flashes of German Chancellor Angela Merkel (de facto face of the European Union), and a mash-up of a football hooligan brawl and a bucolic Scandinavian midsummer celebration. That comic attitude is central to Eurotics tone. "Its one of the main messages of Eurotic; it can all be perceived as a joke, which we personally like, says Torsleff. There is so much unspirited in the world, especially when it comes to politics and world issues, therefore it is nice to be able to showcase something with a bit of a lighter energy and nuance.

Laughs aside, Eurotic has a deeper intent: Im not saying the EU is utopia but I think it has some key points and values that we would not want to live without, he adds. Therefore we wanted to create an online souvenir shop, or call it a memorabilia store, for the EU before it is all gone or forgotten. Sure, a flag hoodie isnt going to change the world, but it is an extension of a young generation thats opting for unity. That should count for something.

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The Rise of the EU Flag on the Runway and at Cult Label Eurotic - Vogue.com

Two U.S. service members were killed late Thursday and a third was wounded when they came under attack during a raid against Islamic State fighters in southern Nangarhar province, Afghanistan, a Defense Dept. official confirmed to Fox News.

The soldiers were battling ISIS-K in partnership with Afghan defense forces in the same area where the "Mother Of All Bombs" was dropped earlier this month.

ISIS WEAPONS CAPTURED BY CANADIAN WOMAN WORKING TO DISARM TERRORISTS

"The fight against ISIS-K is important for the world, but sadly, it is not without sacrifice," said Gen. John W. Nicholson, Commander, U.S. Forces-Afghanistan. "On behalf of all U.S. Forces and our coalition partners, I offer our deepest sympathies to the families, friends and fellow service members of our fallen comrades."

Next of kin have been notified. In keeping with U.S. miltary policy, the names and of those killed will not be released until 24 hours after next-of-kin notification.

Eighteen ISIS militants were killed in the firefight.

A source with the Afghanistan army told Fox News that ISIS hasn't been considered a major threat in the country, where the local army and U.S. forces have been more focused on routing the Taliban. Still, the U.S. has been battling ISIS in Afghanistan for months and estimates that it now includes about 800 fighters there.

The bombing came just days after a U.S. Army special forces soldier was killed in the region. The bomb is the largest non-nuclear weapon ever used in combat by the U.S., and it killed several dozen militants, U.S. officials said.

Fox News' Jennifer Griffin, Hollie McKay and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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2 US Army soldiers killed fighting ISIS in Afghanistan

The operation was targeting ISIS-K, the terror group's Afghanistan affiliate. A US official told CNN the wounded soldier's injuries are not considered life-threatening.

The Pentagon identified the two slain soldiers Friday as Sgt. Joshua P. Rodgers, 22, of Bloomington, Illinois, and Sgt. Cameron H. Thomas, 23, of Kettering, Ohio. They were assigned to 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, based in Fort Benning, Georgia.

"The fight against ISIS-K is important for the world, but sadly, it is not without sacrifice," said Gen. John W. Nicholson, commander of US Forces-Afghanistan. "On behalf of all US forces and our coalition partners, I offer our deepest sympathies to the families, friends and fellow service members of our fallen comrades."

Achin District is the primary base of operations for ISIS in Afghanistan and has been the site of multiple joint US-Afghan counterterrorism missions. A US Army Special Forces soldier was killed fighting the terror group there earlier this month.

It is also where the US dropped one of its most powerful bombs earlier this month, killing close to 100 ISIS fighters, according to Afghan officials.

Nicholson has pledged to eliminate ISIS-K from Afghanistan this year.

"We're going to keep going until they're defeated in 2017," Nicholson told reporters in Kabul this month.

Beginning in 2016, Afghan security forces backed by US military advisers have launched a major offensive against ISIS, with Nicholson saying that the terror group has lost about half of its fighters and been ejected from two-thirds of its territory.

The latest counter-ISIS push began in March of this year.

US officials estimate that ISIS has about 600 to 800 fighters in the country, largely formed from former members of other regional terror groups, including the Pakistani Taliban and Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. ISIS is believed to be behind a series of terror attacks, including the recent deadly attack on a hospital in Kabul.

There are about 8,400 US troops in Afghanistan. The US counterterrorism mission is separate from the NATO-led effort to train, advise and assist the Afghan army and police force in its fight against the Taliban.

US and coalition casualties in Afghanistan are rare, having fallen dramatically since the Afghan government assumed responsibility for combat operations in 2014.

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2 US service members killed in Afghanistan - CNNPolitics.com

KABUL, Afghanistan Afghanis marked the 25th anniversary Friday of their victory over Soviet Russian troops and the birth of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan with parades and speeches.

The public holiday celebrates todays date in 1992 when the Mujahedeen rebel forces overthrew Mohammad Najibullah's pro-Soviet Democratic Republic of Afghanistan.

The occasion, referred to locally as Hashte Saur, is a day in which former Mujahedeen fighters and present-day soldiers and supporters march on bases or streets, history is recited, national songs traditionally sung by the "holy warriors" in the trenches are brought back, mosque prayers are directed to those who lost their lives and iconic green Mujahedeen flags are flown.

"Over 13 years, we lost two-and-a-half million of our people, 7 million refugees fled and many were maimed," Commander Ahmad Muslem Hayat, a former Mujahedeen military chief proudly told Fox News in Kabul. "Today we are celebrating our struggle against and defeat of the communists and Russian occupation."

Chaos was kindled in 1978 after Afghanistan's self-proclaimed prime minister, Mohammed Daoud Khan, was assassinated during the Saur Revolution, which was led by the socialist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA). The PDPA then promptly seized power. But as more and more groups emerged in opposition to the communist leanings of the leadership, the PDPA government sought help from the U.S.S.R.

The following year, the brutal Soviet warstarted and soon thereafter,the seemingly intractable U.S. involvement in the country started, too, as American officials covertly armed andaided the Mujahedeen against the Cold War enemy.

For the soft-spoken and multilingual Hayat, the memories leading up the conflicts outbreak remain vivid. He said growing up his father always feared communism as the "monster of the world," one that would deprive them of their freedom and force them into atheism. At just 17 years old in 1979, Hayat was a student at the military academy in Kabul but a vocal opponent of that monster, the PDPA leadership. After his activism against the regime was discovered, he was expelled.

A few days later, forces surrounded Hayat's family home and broke down the door in the dead of the night. He was arrested and taken into a torture cell at Sadarat by the secret spy police, the NDS, where his sternum was shattered by the knee of an interrogator and his body was endlessly barraged by electric shocks that "felt like a thousand bullets," he said.

"All day you would hear constant screaming. Dead bodies were everywhere. The rooms were filled with prisoners -- girls and boys -- all educated, professional people," Hayat recalled. "The communists told us that listening to the BBC was a crime. They told us they did not care how many people they had to kill because Afghanistan only needs 3 million, not 30 million, people to keep them in power."

Hayat was "luckily" released weeks later when Afghan politician and founding PDPA member Nur Muhammed Taraki was killed. More determined than ever, the young Hayat finished his military training over the border in Peshawar, Pakistan, and joined his distant relative -- the widely hailed hero and perhaps most powerful Mujahedeen leader Ahmad Shar Massoud -- north of Kabul in the north-central Panjshir Valley, by the Hindu Kush mountain range.

"Massoud was the true leader of the freedom fighters. He trained fighters but also believed in justice and formed his own council to build schools and roads," Hayat said.

But Hayat himself led groups of fighters against the Soviet and communist forces in the Panjshir Valley and other areas of Afghanistan. His efforts are credited with killing more enemy forces than most others rebel groups. He frequently ambushed the feared Spetznaz, Soviet special forces, and even he is still amazed that he survived the war.

Two days before Sept. 11, 2001, Massoud, who was deemed friendly to the West and a natural future leader of Afghanistan, was assassinated in a suicide bombing by Al Qaeda operatives. In the view of some regional experts,Massoud was anathema to Usama bin Laden's xenophobic extremism and the then Al Qaeda leader was calculated in ridding Afghanistan of a U.S. ally less than 48 hours before directing planes into New York and Washington buildings.

Hayat insisted that such extremists have since corrupted the significance of what it truly means to fight in the name of jihad, which is what mujahedeen literally means. He said it is often the most stable and secure pockets of Afghanistan that are that way because they are protected by devoted, unpaid former Mujahedeen.

"Former Mujahedeen are very popular with the people, and the Taliban despises this," Hayat noted. "The Taliban has two enemies: Mujahedeen and the Americans."

Over the last decade, the Afghanistan government has been forced to cancel public celebrations of April 28 due to security concerns and Taliban threats. Hayat said this year was no different, but they refuse to be silenced. Even in Taliban strongholds like Helmand Province, smaller-scale celebrations and marching took place before Friday prayers.

"We will not let them stop us from celebrating this day," Hayat added with a shrug and a smile. "On this day, we won."

Hollie McKay has been a FoxNews.com staff reporter since 2007. She has reported extensively from the Middle East on the rise and fall of terrorist groups such as ISIS in Iraq. Follow her on twitter at @holliesmckay

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Afghanistan's people celebrate nation's 25th birthday, victory over Russia - Fox News

Two Army Rangers killed during a raid on an Islamic State compound in eastern Afghanistan may have died as a result of friendly fire during the opening minutes of the fierce, three-hour firefight, the Pentagon said Friday.

Navy Capt. Jeff Davis said the U.S. military is investigating to see if they were accidentally killed by ground fire from Afghan commandos or other American forces. He said the deaths did not appear deliberate.

According to Davis, the head of the Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan, Abdul Haseeb Logari, was the target of the Wednesday raid. He said officials suspect that Logari, the emir of what's called the Islamic State Khorasan group, was among several key leaders killed, but haven't confirmed that. Logari was in charge of the Afghanistan affiliate's command and control and it's connections with the broader Islamic State group and it's leaders.

About 35 other enemy fighters were killed and one other Army Ranger received a minor head wound during the battle, but was able to stay with the assault force.

"This was a dangerous mission and we knew this going in," Davis told Pentagon reporters. "This was the leader of ISIS in Afghanistan. We knew that he was going to be well protected and that they were going to fight very hard to prevent him from being captured or killed. And that is indeed what happened."

About 50 Army Rangers and 40 Afghan commandos were dropped off by helicopter around 10:30 p.m. local time on Wednesday, for the raid in Nangarhar Province's, Mohmand Valley. They were on the ground for about four-and-a-half hours.

"Within minutes of the insertion the combined force came under intense fire from multiple directions. It was during these initial moments of the raid that the two Rangers were mortally wounded," Davis said. He added that the U.S. and Afghan troops were being fired on from prepared positions on all sides, and that the compound was heavily fortified and contained a network of tunnels.

Davis said manned and unmanned aircraft, including AC-130 gunships, Apache helicopters and F-16 fighter jets, were used to support the raid and provide airstrikes to defend the force on the ground and evacuate the wounded.

The military headquarters in Kabul said in a statement that the U.S. and Afghan forces were able to accomplish the mission without civilian casualties, including women and children in the compound.

The compound is located about one or two kilometers (roughly one mile) from the site where the U.S., two weeks ago, dropped what is called the "mother of all bombs" on an IS complex.

The bombing came just days after a U.S. Army special forces soldier was killed in the region. The bomb is the largest non-nuclear weapon ever used in combat by the U.S., and it killed several dozen militants.

Asked whether the friendly fire came from Afghan troops, Davis said, "we were there in a partnered raid with Afghan forces and some of the initial indications led us to believe that that's a possibility." He said it could have been either Afghans or U.S. forces, and a formal investigation is underway.

Killed in the firefight were Army Sgts. Joshua P. Rodgers, 22, of Bloomington, Illinois, and Cameron H. Thomas, 23, of Kettering, Ohio. The families of the two Rangers have been told it was possible they died from friendly fire.

The U.S. has been battling the Islamic State group in Afghanistan for months and estimates that the group now includes about some 800 to 1,000 fighters there.

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Friendly fire investigation launched in deaths of 2 Army Rangers in Afghanistan - Chicago Tribune