The last time I spoke with Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the autocratic Buddhist millionaire who, for nearly two decades, ran the Russian republic of Kalmykia and, perhaps more important, still rules FIDE, the governing body of the international chess world, he told me how close he felt to Saddam Hussein. (He did acknowledge that the relationship was complicated: “I’m a Buddhist. When there’s torture going on and blood flowing, I don’t like it.”) When it comes to friendship, Ilyumzhinov casts a pretty wide net. So it was not surprising to see him photographed yesterday at a chess board with the world’s current most-wanted despot: Muammar Qaddafi.
The men met for a couple of hours in Tripoli Sunday, enough time to have a match, played on a set fashioned by Kalmyk craftsmen that Ilyumzhinov carried to Libya. The two men first got to know each other in 2004, when Tripoli was host to the World Chess Championships. Ilyumzhinov told the Russian news agency Interfax that their meeting this time “was not held in some kind of bunker,” but in an administrative building in Tripoli. (Note to C.I.A.: If you are having trouble tracking down notorious dictators, maybe you should recruit a Grandmaster or two.)
Saddam and Gaddafi can hardly be seen as unusual acquaintances for Ilyumzhinov—not by a long shot. He worshipped Bobby Fischer, the brilliant, erratic, anti-Semitic chess exile who defeated Boris Spassky in 1972 for the world chess title. In his later years, when Fischer was under indictment for having violated sanctions against the former Yugoslavia by playing a rematch against Spassky there in 1992, Ilyumzhinov leapt to his defense. He told me that Fischer was a “star in the history of civilization,” like Newton, Einstein, Copernicus, and the cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. In 1995, Ilyumzhinov turned up in Budapest carrying a bag with a hundred thousand dollars in it. He handed the money to Fischer and said it was compensation for the Soviet Union’s failure to pay royalties for Fischer’s book “My Sixty Memorable Games.”
He brings excellent publicity for chess and FIDE.
I didn’t think that the motto of FIDE “Gens una sumus” would include dictators. Either our excellent president has proofs of misleading information from mass-media about the ferocity of those people, or he’s hypocritical.
Since the Michael Spector item is a political item, I feel justified in making a political statement in this blogspot, which normally confines itself to sports.
The real “alien” is this story is Michael Spector himself. Does he really think that Ilyumzhinov is somehow being special by consorting with Gaddafi and Saddam Hussein. At various times in recent history, the Executive Branch of the United States and its Presidents were bedfellows of both of these dictators when it suited their objectives. If Ilyumzhinov is a crackpot, then several of our Presidents are crackpots, too.
Please, let’s stick to chess. No opinions, please, from political (or politically minded) columnists from New York or anywhere else.
Thanks.
Ilyumzhinov is definitely an enemy of the West.
Where is my bag of money?