No, not the Olympics, they're still going ahead. The London bid for the 2012 World Chess Championship has been withdrawn by the potential organisers. A great shame, since Malcolm Pein has shown himself to be an excellent organiser, establishing...
Open letter regarding the Women's World Chess Championship 2010 We, the players of the Women’s World Chess Championship 2010 in Antakya/Hatay who have signed this document below, would like to share with the chess community and FIDE our thoughts...
The world chess governing body FIDE has announced the dates for the candidates matches to determine the next challenger for Vishy Anand's world title. The matches will take place between 3-27 May 2011 in Kazan, Russia. Interestingly, FIDE seems ...
Following on from the shock announcement by Magnus Carlsen of his withdrawal from the upcoming world chess championship candidates matches, FIDE has given its response. FIDE respects that every player makes his own decisions and regrets that G...
The biggest contest taking place in Khanty-Mansiysk has been decided. The incumbent FIDE president, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov has been re-elected for another 4-year term after beating Anatoly Karpov by 95 votes to 55. It was a bitter and unpleasant pol...
This news story is straight from the files of "you couldn't make it up". Incumbent FIDE president Kirsan Ilyumzhinov has made a bid of $10 million to purchase the land at 45 Park Place, New York to build an "International Chess Center". This add...
Breaking news has emerged from the FIDE Presidential Meeting held today, that the venue for the 2011 candidates matches is to be switched to Kazan in Russia. The original venue had been the Azerbaijan capital, Baku, but Lev Aronian's qualificatio...
With the sort of press coverage that our royal game gets from popular newswires, you could forgive the average man in the street for thinking, like Sherlock Holmes, that all chess players have a scheming mind. Recent developments will do nothing ...
Chess politics is not a subject that thrills the heart of many chess fans, but the importance of the future leadership and direction of the world's governing body FIDE is hard to overstate. Candidates for the presidency have to be nominated by na...
The former world champion and prospective FIDE President Anatoly Karpov (pictured) has released his mission statement as part of his campaign to win support from national chess federations. The German and French federations have expressed their p...
Multi-millionaire Kirsan Ilyumzhinov from Kalmykia has been president of FIDE since 1995, and although he has ploughed a lot of his own money into the game, commercial sponsors are few and far between. Rightly or wrongly, FIDE has a reputation fo...
At the recent FIDE executive board meeting in Halkidiki, Greece, one of the most bizarre suggestions yet was thankfully NOT approved. However, the FIDE powers-that-be may still try to introduce it at a later date. The already hugely controversia...
Today marks the end of the (extended) deadline for bids from potential hosts for the planned Anand v Topalov match for the World Chess Championship. Although none of the bidders could provide the bank guarantees that FIDE was looking for, the bid...
Women only chess events and women's chess titles - are they an invaluable help in promoting the women's game among commercial sponsors and providing opportunities for female chess players, or do they segregate talented women players into a self-pe...
The resolutely opaque FIDE bidding process to host the planned Anand versus Topalov world championship match some time in 2010 has so far failed to attract a bid backed by real, honest, check our Swiss bank account if you don't believe us, MONEY. ...
What is the difference between a sport and a game? And what qualifies a sport to be an Olympic sport? Is it all just a question of semantics? Or perhaps money? Kirsan Ilyumzhinov (pictured), the president of FIDE, has been courting the Olympic ...
UEP are Universal Event Promotions, the organisation behind last year's highly successful World Chess Championship match between Vishy Anand and Vladimir Kramnik. Following FIDE's opening up of the new WCC cycle to bidders, they are the first, an...
FIDE's Grand Prix series should have been a good idea; a series of tournaments featuring the world's top players to select a challenger for the World Championship. However, changes to the rules and subsequent withdrawals by players and organisers...
Don't worry. FIDE hasn't finally gone completely crazy and turned the royal game into a crazy chess variant. Maybe next year... For now, most of the proposed changes, due to take affect from 1 July 2009, simply clear up any ambiguity in the rul...
The Association Of Chess Professionals (ACP) is the closest thing that chess professionals have to a union. Organising professsional chess players can be a bit like trying to herd cats, so they have their work cut out! Their purpose, according t...
Magnus Carlsen has decided to withdraw from the current Grand Prix series of events. The full announcement is at his father's blog, here. Carlsen's decision simply reflects the reality of the situation which he, and the remaining Grand Prix comp...
As reported recently, the next tournament in the Grand Prix series, due to be held in Doha, Qatar, has been cancelled. New unconfirmed reports suggest that another event in the series - Montreux - which was due to be held in April, is also set t...
Following the huge fuss surrounding Vassily Ivanchuk and the drugs test that never was, FIDE have issued the following rather terse announcement on their website... Under the FIDE Anti Doping rules, the Ivanchuk case has been referred to the FIDE...
You knew it had to happen. Just when you thought that the 38th Chess Olympiad had passed off without any serious off-the-board scandals, two blew up out of nowhere as soon as the event had finished! The first incident, and perhaps the most serio...
