An IS (Iceland) car sticker associated with Islamic State

A Belgian couple who have visited Iceland fifteen times were recently arrested by armed police in Switzerland because they had an IS sticker on their car. 

Photographer Joh­an Van Cut­sem tells mbl.is that he was travelling with his wife through Switzerland on their way to Sardinia when they were pulled over by heavily armed police. The incident occured on March 28th, less than a week after the terrorist attack on Brussels. 

"We were near Luzern when I noticed a police vehicle following us. They caught up with us and police officers ordered us to stop our car. We did, and two police officers in bulletproof vests carrying guns approached us," says Van Cutsem. "Next they searched us and we could hear a policeman reporting back to base on his walkie-talkie. He had his hand on his gun. 

He describes the atmosphere as extremely tense until the police officer asked them whether they had visited Iceland. "They then became friendlier and apologized for interrupting our journey."

The IS sticker to them had looked suspicious, and they thought it sood for ISIS and not Ísland (Iceland). "They thought this was very suspicious as we were driving a car out of Belgium. We found the whole incident quite extraordinary."

Van Cut­sem  decided to contact Mbl.is and Iceland Monitor to warn people against driving through mainland Europe with an IS sticker. The couple had driven around with the car sticker for twelve years, since their first trip with the Norræna ferry to Iceland. 

The Swiss police asked the couple to remove the sticker from the car. 

Johan Van Cutsem and his wife Anne Bogaert in Landamannalaugar, Iceland. Photo/ Johan Van Cutsem