00:00Fifty years ago, Gilfie Gerson cut British fishing trawl wires and dodged Royal Navy frigates on board small Icelandic Coast
00:10Guard vessels.
00:11Those maritime confrontations between Iceland and the UK are known as the Cold Wars.
00:18Iceland won, asserting control of the waters and the fishing industry that are the foundation of the island's economy.
00:26Now, the fear of losing control of that resource is at the heart of an EU referendum on August 29.
00:33I would feel that what I did as a young man is for nothing.
00:39Gerson was a member of Iceland's Coast Guard and a radio operator in the Cold Wars.
00:45I would vote in favor, I would say yes, because I think we should try to find out if it's
00:53beneficial or not.
00:54But if I find it not beneficial, say we completely lose control of our fishing stocks, then I would definitely
01:04say no when and if a possible agreement is on the table.
01:08The ballot later this month is not a vote on membership, and any accession treaty would require a second referendum.
01:18Iceland had applied to join the EU in 2009 and spent four years negotiating before a new Euroskeptic government shelved
01:26the process in 2013.
01:28For many, the vote boils down to a trade-off, where the lower interest rates and a seat at Europe's
01:35table are worth ceding some control over the fisheries and self-determination that defined Iceland's independence since it broke away
01:43from Denmark eight decades ago.
01:46Hadrian Marte Stottir is head of Fisheries Iceland, an industry association.
01:51We have 100% of the profit in Iceland, and we want to keep it that way.
01:56So that is our worries if we join the common fisheries policy, is that this value chain that has generated
02:04all this profit for the Icelandic population, that that will be torn apart.
02:10Fisheries remain central to Iceland's economy and identity alike.
02:14Much of the cod eaten in British fish and chip shops today comes from Icelandic waters.
02:20I think it revolves around mostly keeping control of our own choices and decisions as a country.
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