EU sanctions against chess president: After more than 30 years, Russian rule could end

Last week the European Union adopted its 21st package of sanctions against Russia. Given the goals that the EU is pursuing – “to further paralyze Russia’s economy and war machine” – it initially seems surprising that the President of the World Chess Federation (Fide) is among the 48 individuals sanctioned. But the EU believes that it has found good reasons to include the Russian Arkady Dvorkovich on this list, which, in addition to numerous arms contractors, also includes Mikhail Degtyaryov, the Russian Minister of Sports and President of the Russian Olympic Committee.

The justification states that Dvorkovich not only has a past in the Kremlin, including as deputy prime minister from 2012 to 2018, but that as Fide president he also endangers the “territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of Ukraine”. The essence of the matter is that Dvorkovich allowed the Russian Chess Federation (CFR) to hold thousands of tournaments in Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories.

Fide suspended the Russian association CFR for three years in mid-June. However, this only happened after the International Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas) essentially forced them to do so. There were also media reports back then that Dvorkovich was threatened with EU sanctions. Against this background, the suspension of the CFR seemed like his last attempt to get his head out of the loop – in vain. Dvorkovich has announced his resignation as Fide president. The interim president is his previous deputy, the former world chess champion Viswanathan Anand from India.

Who will be the new Fide president will be decided in two months. On September 26th, the delegates of the national associations in Samarkand, Uzbekistan will elect Dvorkovich’s successor – and the chess world is suddenly faced with a crucial question: After more than 30 years, will Russian rule end in fide?

It was in 1995 when a Russian was elected president of the association for the first time in Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. He stayed for more than two decades until Dvorkovich succeeded him in 2018. Interestingly, it was Western sanctions that ultimately brought Ilyumzhinov’s downfall: the USA sanctioned him in 2015 because he is said to have helped the then Syrian ruler and Putin friend Bashar al-Assad to illegally buy oil.

The fact that Ilyumzhinov remained in office for almost three years could be viewed favorably as his perseverance. In fact, Ilyumzhinov, who was photographed at the chessboard with the Libyan dictator Muammar al-Gaddafi and was involved in questionable corporate networks surrounding chess marketing rights, was considered by many to be the absolute wrong choice. Even critics of Dworkowitsch do not deny that he has professionalized Fide, especially in its external appearance.

The Kremlin’s influence continued to grow with Dvorkovich, as the tournaments in the occupied territories show. Chess is an important part of Russian culture and the office of Fide President is a valuable lever for Moscow to protect its own interests in world chess. When Dvorkovich was elected in 2018, Vladimir Putin personally congratulated him. Moscow celebrated his re-election four years later as a “victory”. And last September, Fide almost became the first IOC-recognized sports association to lift all restrictions on Russian athletes.

Who will be the new Fide president? Two German entrepreneurs are running for office

So one can assume that the Kremlin will also be looking very closely at the Fide general assembly in two months. There are three candidates up for election, and the approximately two hundred delegates will hardly be able to avoid dealing with their connections to Russia. In any case, no one should believe in the myth of apolitical chess after two Fide presidents were sanctioned within a good ten years.

This is exactly what Jan Henric Buettner could use. The Hamburg entrepreneur is the only candidate who cannot be said to have any proximity to Russia. What could hurt him is that until recently no one said he was close to chess. Buettner has only been involved in the mental sport since 2024, when he and the many-time world champion Magnus Carlsen set up a series of tournaments in a glossy format that immediately expanded from northern Germany to Paris, Cape Town, Singapore and Las Vegas.

Buettner, who once founded AOL Europe (and subsequently became very rich thanks to winning a lawsuit against his former employer), is trying out as a startup candidate. The promises of his campaign can be summed up in one word: growth. More sponsors, more money, more support for the national associations.

So far he has left the positioning on Russia to his deputy; British official Malcolm Pein has been one of the loudest critics of Dvorkovich’s Fide for years. Now, however, Buettner himself condemned a Russian attack that destroyed a chess center in Kherson, Ukraine, over the weekend. The 61-year-old is now seen as the one who could unite many European voices behind him. Wadim Rosenstein, who is supported by the German Chess Federation (DSB), probably has an outside chance.

Rosenstein is also still fairly new to the chess world and a few years ago also created a highly prized tournament. He also made the Düsseldorfer SK the German chess champion with a lot of money and well-known grandmasters. But among the European associations, the entrepreneur seems to be most interested in a photo. This shows him at a chess tournament in Moscow shortly after the full Russian invasion. There he sits opposite the grandmaster Sergei Karjakin, an ardent and avowed Putin supporter who now sits in the Russian parliament.

Rosenstein was born in Ukraine, but has operated on the Russian market for years with his German logistics company. That’s obviously enough for many people not to trust him completely, especially since he doesn’t manage to clear up their doubts. Rosenstein simply claims to be apolitical. The fact that the Russian association president recently assured that Rosenstein’s candidacy was “not a project” of the Russians may have done him more harm than good – even if he was recently able to win over several other national associations, such as the Latvian one, as supporters.

And then there is billionaire Timur Turlov, president of the Kazakh Chess Federation, who initially ran as Arkady Dvorkovich’s deputy. Now he wants to become president himself after his resignation. Turlov was born in Moscow and only exchanged his Russian citizenship for Kazakh citizenship in 2022, although this may have had more pragmatic reasons: his trading company called Freedom Holding, which is now one of the most important sponsors of Fide, is listed on the US stock exchange.

However, the company is not without controversy. Almost three years ago, research by the investigative platform attracted attention Hindenburg Research There is a stir that Freedom Holding is supposed to help Russian oligarchs circumvent Western sanctions. And Turlov himself is also sanctioned – by Ukraine, which accuses him of being close to Russia. In other words: Timur Turlov is the business-as-usual candidate.