Five men arrested for displaying Islamic State flag in Belgium

Belgian police have arrested five men for displaying what appeared to be an Islamic State flag at one of Brussels' most popular tourist attractions, local media reported on Sunday.

The group were arrested on Saturday afternoon and released later in the evening without charge, after it emerged that they were actors putting on an artistic performance.

Belgium's French-language public broadcaster RTBF reported that the five men were wearing "radical Islamic attire" and gathered at Manneken Pis, a statue of a urinating boy in the centre of the Belgian capital, which attracts thousands of tourists every day.

The men, whose identities have not been made public, unfolded a black flag with Arabic inscriptions on it, similar to that used by the Islamic State radical organisation.

Jennfier Vanderputten, a spokeswoman for the Brussels public prosecutor's office, told RTBF: "When questioned, they quickly explained that they were part of an artistic group. They were theatre performers and they did not have terrorist motivations."

"To the contrary, their aim was to carry out a playful action, to make the point that people should not let themselves be intimidated by terrorist threats."

She said their version of events was backed up by video surveillance footage at the site, which showed that no inflammatory or threatening language was used, and none of the five arrested men was known to police for any previous criminal activity.

Belgium remains on high alert since the Paris terror attacks in January. On Aug. 28, Belgian interior minister Jan Jambon announced that up to 200 military personnel would continue to patrol "at-risk" sites in Brussels including embassies until at least the end of September. Endit