Fish, ships and sovereignty: Iceland weighs its European future

Gylfi Geirsson and Sigurbjorn Svavarsson cut British fishing trawl wires and dodged Royal Navy frigates on board small Icelandic coastguard vessels 50 years ago, using guerrilla-like tactics to keep foreign fleets out of their waters.

Iceland won the series of confrontations known as the Cod Wars, and control of those waters became the foundation of the volcanic island’s economy.

Half a century later, the fear of losing control is at the heart of an August 29 referendum on whether to reopen membership talks with the European Union .

For many, the vote boils down to a trade-off: whether lower interest rates and a seat at Europe’s table are worth ceding some control over the fisheries and self-determination that defined Iceland’s independence since it broke away from Denmark eight decades ago.

Public debate ahead of the vote is deeply rooted in fishing rights but now also focusing on the cost of living and President Donald Trump’s threats to acquire neighbouring Greenland, which has raised questions over Iceland’s own defences.

“The situation as I find it today is that it’s the fear that we might lose control of what we fought for,” said Svavarsson, who served as a first mate on the coastguard vessel Aegir in 1976 at the height of the Cod Wars and will likely vote against restarting talks.

Iceland had applied to join the EU in 2009, in the wake of a banking collapse the previous year, and spent four years negotiating before a new eurosceptic government shelved the process in 2013.

“I will definitely say yes,” said Geirsson, a radio operator during the confrontations with Britain who went on to spend 42 years in the coastguard, later representing Iceland in international fisheries negotiations.

“We cannot be like an isolated island out in the middle of nowhere. We have to have co-operation with neighbouring countries,” he said, adding he would at least like to see what deal could be reached before deciding.

But if Iceland were to lose control of its fishing grounds after negotiating a deal with the EU, he would vote against joining.

“I would feel that what I did as a young man was for nothing,” he said.

The ballot is not a vote on membership and any accession treaty would require a second referendum.

A Gallup poll this month found voters split on restarting talks: 46% said they would vote yes and 46% no, with 8% undecided. Polls show a majority against actually joining the bloc.

Fisheries remain central to Iceland’s economy and identity alike, alongside aluminium and tourism. Much of the cod eaten in British fish and chip shops today comes from Icelandic waters , a legacy of the very dispute that Geirsson and Svavarsson fought.