Dr. Adrian Siegel, the treasurer of the World Chess Federation (known by the French acronym FIDE) has submitted a letter to the body's executive board and other executives informing it that their bank, UBS, is closing the Federation's bank account. Since 2015 the President of FIDE, Kirsan Ilymzhinov, has been listed on the Office of Foreign Accounts Control sanctions list of the U.S. Treasury for financial support of Syria. According to Dr. Siegel, "...after more than two years of Kirsan Ilyumzhinow's [sic] presence on the sanction list... UBS has announced that they will immediately close our accounts."
Over the past two years there were reports of Mr. Ilymzhinov resigning from the presidency in favor of his vice-president, only to attempt to regain executive control, and dissension on the Executive Board of FIDE over the matter. Allegations of corruption have plagued Mr. Ilymzhinov for some years, but he has been re-elected twice over chess Grandmasters Garry Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov in separate elections. In 2010 he proposed building a chess center at the World Trade Center attack site.
The BBC reports that representatives of Mr. Ilymzhinov have denied the allegations as outrageous and false.
Story at chessbase.com by Macauley Peterson.
Checkmate, baby?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 15 2018, @11:03AM (7 children)
But why.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday February 15 2018, @11:21AM (6 children)
Attention whoring for a game that has been made utterly obsolete by computers. Kind of like the "controversial and trendy" logo.
Or is chess reaaaally going to bring humans together in harmony? Perhaps to destroy the computers, AI, and bots.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 15 2018, @11:31AM
World chess has been run by organized crime since 1978.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Thursday February 15 2018, @01:45PM (1 child)
> a game that has been made utterly obsolete by computers
The game of chess isn't obsolete. Unlike checkers it still is not solved. But we may be obsolete. Computers may soon be better than us at pretty much everything. Better at every game including sports, and better drivers, assembly line workers, housekeepers, investors, accountants, explorers, surgeons, and even, perhaps, better at science.
With our tools and our cooperative nature, we've made all other large animals obsolete. None can even think of competing with us. When have you ever heard of a pride of lions or a pack of wolves actually taking land from people, running the people out? Maybe that sometimes happened in the Stone Age, but even then we had the tools and organization to win. Now the only land they have is the land we let them have. Even the oceans are not safe from us, thanks to nets and ocean going fishing boats.
But now, it's our turn to be inferior. Before much longer, maybe everyone will have to become cyborgs to stay competitive. Today, we carry smart phones on our persons. Tomorrow, perhaps the smart phones will be surgically implanted in our bodies.
And yet we still hold footraces despite that for our size we are possibly the slowest runners in the world, easily beaten by cats and dogs who weigh 1/10th the human average. Swimming meets are even sillier, really, because swimming is a whole lot faster with a simple pair of fins, yet we race without them.
(Score: 2) by dry on Friday February 16 2018, @03:08AM
Actually Humans are one of the best runners, perhaps not that good at a sprint but a person can run a horse to death, little well a cat or even a dog. We evolved to run down deer, antelope and such and then club them to death when they're too tired to do anything in response.
(Score: 2) by qzm on Thursday February 15 2018, @11:45PM (2 children)
Tell me, what game (rather than sport) do you think has NOT been made utterly obsolete by computers?
And what do you think obsolete means in this context? There is some reason people cannot keep enjoying the game? really?
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday February 16 2018, @12:19AM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tricorder_X_Prize [wikipedia.org]
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(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday February 16 2018, @12:24AM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solved_game [wikipedia.org]
There are some unsolved games out there, but they will fall eventually. Sports is another matter (it will be made obsolete the way we know it by biotechnology and medicine instead of computers or robots).
Chess is obsolete in the way we know it. There is a new game of chess: cheating using the computer. Eventually, players will start to have brain implants making anti-cheating infeasible or impractical.
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