Timur and his team. What rules does FIDE play by?

The International Chess Federation seems to have decided to play the game according to rules no one knows. Or almost nobody. Timur Turlov, 38-year-old Kazakh businessman and General Director of Freedom Holding, was elected the new FIDE President. At the General Assembly in Samarkand, he won the elections from German citizens Vadim Rosenstein and Jan Henrik Buettner.

As reported, the new FIDE president intends to take a large-scale approach to the development of world chess. At the same time, he was initially far from this sport and became interested in it, supporting the school chess club, which his children attended. Timur Turlov, which is important, is a native of Moscow, who received Kazakh citizenship in 2022 and renounced his Russian passport. He made a name for himself in investment. In 2018, the investment company he founded received the award “Financial elite of Russia” as the fastest growing broker. Turlov intends to implement the experience gained in the main field of activity in FIDE. He presented the approach according to which the development of FIDE will be linked to the support of national federations through media, digital tools and education. For this purpose, the new president is ready to allocate at least $1.5 million annually for at least four years, separately from the FIDE budget.

The FIDE presidential election was scandalous (Rosenstein, who lost in the second round, for example, rolled out an official protest), but the choice of vice presidents became even more scandalous or controversial. There are only seven. And one of them at the Assembly in Samarkand was elected as an independent candidate former Minister of sports of Russia Pavel Kolobkov. His candidacy was put forward by the federations of Belarus, Cuba and Tajikistan, later approved by the election commission, while Russia did not have the right to vote in the elections. No one was embarrassed that the Olympic champion in fencing has no connection with chess. In fact, as there is no adviser to the office of the President of Ukraine Mikhail Podolyak, who made his deputy Turlov himself, but against whom violently opposed the chess Federation of Ukraine. The FSU said that Podolyak (who, as many in Minsk know, was revoked his residence permit in Belarus more than 20 years ago due to numerous publications that threatened national security) has nothing to do with the chess movement, and the federation itself did not authorize him to represent the country and regards what is happening as an attempt to “raider seizure”. I will do my best to bring the community together. So that the chess community found the strength to negotiate, move towards each other, respect each other, Turlov said in his inaugural speech, but further events confused everything. At the suggestion of its new president, the FIDE General Assembly upheld the decision to suspend the Russian Chess Federation (FSHR). Delegates rejected the proposals of the federations of Armenia, Belarus, Cuba and Nicaragua to restore the membership of the FSHR. At the same time, Russia saw encouraging signs in the events in Samarkand.

- The new team has just arrived, said Dmitry Svishchev, First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Sport. Now the new leadership of FIDE, including Vice President Pavel Kolobkov, needs to carefully understand the problems that exist. I’m sure there will be a return soon enough. Of course, we all want a full comeback right now. But there are some formalities to go through. There will definitely be a return. The team is strong, young, will defend the interests of athletes. I am sure that in the near future we will see changes in the structure of FIDE and decisions for the benefit of world chess.

The only thing that is clear now in world chess are the winners of the Chess Olympiad held in Samarkand. For the second time in its history, the Uzbek team won among men, Chinese women became the strongest among women. The Belarusian men’s team took 27th place, the women’s – 63rd. In the decisive match, by the way, the Uzbeks met with the Ukrainians, and Turlov made a symbolic first move (pictured) for Nodirbek Abdusattorov, moving the pawn to the e4. What would that mean?