Kirsan Sanctioned by US Treasury Department

[John McKenna]

The yanks are more than welcome to him. Maybe they can get to the bottom of what happened to Larisa Yudina as well.

According to the Chessbase News article -

"An advisor to Ilyumzhinov, then President of Kalmykia, was convicted in Russia in 1999 for the murder of an opposition journalist who reportedly was investigating an offshore business registration mechanism..." [US Treasury OFAC Press Release]

That may be as far as getting "to the bottom of what happened to Larisa Yudina" will ever go, since it was dealt with under Russian criminal jurisdiction.

The press release quoted by Chessbase continues -

"... an offshore business registration mechanism in Kalmykia tied to Ilyumzhinov. Russian authorities subsequently closed... [it]... after concluding that it was being used for illegal purposes." [US Treasury OFAC]

The "business registration mechanism" had an international dimension as it was "offshore". How offshore was it? Just Russia-Kalmykia or did it involve other financial jurisdictions?

(Strange to say but Scotland has now become a leading shade - as opposed to a light - in the world of shadowy offshore business registrations, with many Russian, Baltic and other dubious nations' hiding - as opposed to holding - 'companies' being set up there in order to screen and launder money illegally obtained elsewhere. It is a scandal that the UK and Scottish authorities are doing little, if anything, to halt!)

And, despite Ilyumzhinov seeming to claim in the article that he has no foreign assets, he does travel abroad on FIDE business and seems to conduct some personal business at the same time. It is in that respect that he may find he will experience some difficulies from now on - his wings may well have been somewhat clipped.

Far from keeping a low profile, the FIDE President seems determined to brazen it out and go ahead with his impending, planned visit to the US. Although he has not been declared persona non grata by the US government the welcome there is likely to be a limited and frosty one. (European leaders, including those in the UK, should take note and cease to welcome Kirsan like a trusted partner and friend.)

His long tenure - as the Godfather of International Chess - may be drawing to a close, or at least become diminished.

[Brian Towers]

His long tenure - as the Godfather of International Chess - may be drawing to a close, or at least become diminished.

One of the biggest mistakes beginner chess players make is playing "hope chess". When analyzing the position they don't always consider their opponent's best moves instead they only consider the moves they hope their opponent will make. This comes from a failure to put themselves in their opponents position.

This comment (and many others in this thread) is making the mistake of "hope politics". This move is purely political. As in the case of Russian aggression in Ukraine this is weak displacement behavior by the US. Instead of taking more concrete actions against Syria they are resorting to pointless sanctions. I suspect that if you talk to Russians they will interpret this as just more American imperialism and pretty toothless imperialism at that. Are they 'bovvered'? I doubt it very much.

[John McKenna]

Brian, sounds like here you're in the MJMcCready "... unfortunately I doubt whether anything will change" school of thought as far as Kirsan's concerned.

Was Sepp (Blatter) "bovvered" as he recently hovered... between life and death?

Probably not that much, actually, but I'm sure he just didn't feel quite the same as before and felt the need to milk some media sympathy from his disgraceful fall.

Will Kirsan suffer a similar fall? Probably not - although the Swiss used to be untouchables the US has finally started to get to them - Kalmykia, deep inside Russia, is going to remain beyond US reach. However, once the prey leaves Russia, as Kirsan must do to fulfill his role as FIDE President, he becomes a vulnerable target for hunters. Just that thought alone, which - despite his bravado - must have entered his head, will introduce a shadow of doubt that was not present before. He'll try to carry on as usual, but it won't be quite the same and may worsen enough to unsettle, if not unseat, him.

Never mind the politics of hope - that bird flew long ago - we're in an age of hopeless politics. Obama, like Jimmy Carter (and Jeremy Corbyn), is a man with some kind of conscience so he tries to limit the damage that other, more warlike, leaders (including Tony Blair) have inflicted.

If you think a President Trump will improve the state of the world dream on. The problem is that the US hawks constantly overshoot, while the US doves constantly undershoot. And, while the British and US Empires slowly and largely made the modern world the other two current great powers - Putin's Russia and Shi's China - were made by WWI & WWII and their aftermaths, which resulted in very traumatic births and childhoods for the postwar incarnations of those two nations. A recipe for disaster!

There is, of course, an historical 5th problem-nation state (in addition to the British, US, Russian & Chinese ones) and that is modern Israel, which although small in many respects looms large on the world stage as a focus of, and for, many wordly ills. It, too, was born out of WWI & WWII and the thoughts and deeds of British & American leaders determined to impose their Biblical wills, and consequent woes, on the world.

Today, anyone who inhabits the state of Israel as a descendant of the Twelve Tribes must surely do so on the basis of a mythical mountain of hope, much of which rests on the shaky man-made foundations I sketchily allude to above. It would have been better all round if postwar Israel had been established in the Berlin-Moscow frying pan of East Prussia instead of the Damascus-Baghdad-Riyadh infernal triangle of the Middle East.

(I hope you do not interpret what I say, above, as me putting myself in your position - as you suggested opponents do - since I do not regard you as an opponent. I am opposed to the party-political demagogues and zealous partisans continuing to impose their warped will. I see no point in putting myself in their shoes since I'd be risking too much.)

[Brian Towers]

Was Sepp (Blatter) "bovvered" as he recently hovered... between life and death?

I don't know. Has he committed the same US crime of bribery and corruption with US money that some of his colleagues have been charged with? My understanding is "No" since he is still in Switzerland.

Will Kirsan suffer a similar fall? Probably not - although the Swiss used to be untouchables the US has finally started to get to them - Kalmykia, deep inside Russia, is going to remain beyond US reach. However, once the prey leaves Russia, as Kirsan must do to fulfill his role as FIDE President, he becomes a vulnerable target for hunters.

Your understanding of Kirsan's position is clearly very different to mine. My understanding is that he is in a similar position to the Russian officials who had sanctions imposed against them in relation to their decision making positions regarding Russia's actions in Ukraine. He is not charged with breaking US laws and is not subject to or at risk of American "justice". He is not hunted. He is not prey. He may be inconvenienced if he wants to travel to the US and is denied a visa. Amongst his core voters he may very well have gained kudos from American opposition to him. His position as FIDE president may have actually been strengthened.

If you think a President Trump will improve the state of the world dream on.

I really do hope you are joking! Trump has no redeeming features (in my humble opinion, of course).
I don't know what chance he has of getting the Republican nomination, let alone beating Billary, but my choice from the Republicans would be the black doctor, Carson. He appears intelligent and interesting, unlike most of the rest, and would provide the best entertainment value amongst the candidates for someone like me who doesn't have a vote.

On the same principle I desperately wanted Newt Gingrich to win the Republican nomination last time round even as I realized that what made him so interesting also made him unelectable in the US. That grinning Mormon, whose name I have already forgotten, with the 5 kids and a wife to whom he'd been happily and faithfully married for about 40 years, was just so depressingly boring.

I particularly don't want Bush 3 or Clinton 2 to win. I think political dynasties are as reprehensible in the US as they are in North Korea, Syria and Saudi.

[Brian Towers]

John, just a few days after Turkey, a country we previously thought of as an ally, at least economically, of Russia, shot down a Russian plane very close to the Turkey-Syrian border (who knows on which side?) and then executed (I can't think of a better word and I don't feel qualified to use the word "murdered") the pilot after he thought he had parachuted to safety, ponder on these imponderables:

Israel has for a long time now and still does fly with relative impunity over Syrian territory. Why, it's just a couple of years since Israel bombed and destroyed a Syrian embryo nuclear plant.
It might appear that Russian planes currently fly with relative impunity and no fanfare either side of the Syrian-Israeli border.
No planes have been shot down on either side of the border and no pilots executed.
Putin and Netanyahu recently met and no reports were made of nasty insults passing between them unlike other less recent high level meetings.
In these complicated times it is so difficult to know who are your allies and who are your foes.

[John McKenna]

Thank you for your considered replies, Brian.

Athough the Swiss are no longer as untouchable as they once were, Sepp remaining there at present may be because his home nation is still the world's bank vault. The US dollar may be strong but, pound for pound, the Swiss franc is still stronger.

Strauss-Kahn went on a jaunt to the US - what happened to him?

Blair went off to make peace - how did that go down?

Assange went on a trip to Sweden - where is he now?

Snowdon went out to post a letter - why did he have to go so far?

Manning, like Vanunu, went straight to jail!!

I was just sounding off about Trump.

Freud is supposed to have said -

"America is a mistake, admittedly a gigantic mistake, but a mistake nevertheless."

I subscribe to that view, and no matter who leads there big errors will continue as long as it exists. Like it or not, I think we are all "subject to or at risk of American 'Justice'" and to a host of other dubious things that emanate from the United States.

Bin Laden and Putin felt it overbearing and started to kick against it violently - their example will be probably be followed, sooner or later, by others. A similar thing happened in Judea and elsewhere, including Britannia, under the Romans.

Of course, the American colossal retiarius that stands - one foot in the Atlantic and the other in the Pacific - wielding his trident from Washington with its three prongs being London, Jerusalem and Tokyo-Seoul and his almost invisible net, of about 900 overseas military bases, covering the world will be more than a match for the Russian bear, Arab camel and Chinese snake, should they enter the arena, for some considerble time, yet.

(Although I've already said, here and there, that there will be a concerted effort by the Russian bear and the Chinese snake to rid the mainland of Eurasia of the American eagle, as far as possible.)

It all puts me in mind of this -

1
We are the Magians of old,
Islam is not the faith we hold,
In irreligion is our fame,
And we have made our creed a shame.
2
Now to the tavern we repair
To gamble all our substance there,
Now in the monastery cell
We worship with the infidel.
3
When Satan chances us to see
He doffs his cap respectfully,
For we have lessons to impart
To Satan in the tempter's art.
4
We are not in such nature made
Of any man to be afraid;
Head and foot in naked pride
Like sultans o'er the earth we ride.

I've tried to sow a seed of doubt about that view, so does the poet -

5
But we, alas, aweary are
And the road is very far;
We know not by what way to come
Unto the place that is our home.
6
And therefore we are in despair
How to order our affair
Because, wherever we have sought,
Our minds were utterly distraught.

Still, the poet does not lose hope -

7
When shall it come to pass, ah when,
That suddenly beyond our ken,
We shall succeed to rend this veil
That doth our whole affair conceal?
8
What veil so ever after this
Apparent to our vision is,
With the flame of knowledge true
We shall consume it through and through.
9
Where at the first in that far place
We come into the world of space,
Our soul by travail in the end
To that perfection shall ascend.
10
And so shall 'Attar shattered be
And, rapt in sudden ecstasy,
Soar to godly vision, even
Beyond the veils of earth and heaven.

Farid al-Din 'Attar (1142-1221?)

(The poet is said to have been beheaded by the invading Mongols.)

[John McKenna]

John, just a few days after Turkey, a country we previously thought of as an ally, at least economically, of Russia, shot down a Russian plane very close to the Turkey-Syrian border (who knows on which side?) and then executed (I can't think of a better word and I don't feel qualified to use the word "murdered") the pilot after he thought he had parachuted to safety, ponder on these imponderables:

Israel has for a long time now and still does fly with relative impunity over Syrian territory. Why, it's just a couple of years since Israel bombed and destroyed a Syrian embryo nuclear plant.
It might appear that Russian planes currently fly with relative impunity and no fanfare either side of the Syrian-Israeli border.
No planes have been shot down on either side of the border and no pilots executed.
Putin and Netanyahu recently met and no reports were made of nasty insults passing between them unlike other less recent high level meetings.
In these complicated times it is so difficult to know who are your allies and who are your foes.

Brian, I know that things look different from where you are, but I find it hard to understand how any member of NATO - even Turkey or Germany - could be regarded by Putin as an ally of any description. (I think he regards them as important potential weak links in the NATO chain.) In 1939 trade between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia was booming and, in August, they signed an infamous non-aggression pact... but you know what happened, without warning, in May 1941.

The reason why the Turks have turned on Russia is because since the Russians began their air campaign in Syria they have frequently attacked areas that are controlled by Syrian Turkmen (Syrians of Turkish extraction). Blood is thicker than vodka.

[Roger de Coverly]

The FIDE site sometimes reads like Kirsan's Facebook page complete with selfies taken of all the places and "leaders" that he meets. It has yet to mention the US Treasury action. Not that the ECF site or forum have either.

[Michael Mkpadi]

The FIDE site sometimes reads like Kirsan's Facebook page complete with selfies taken of all the places and "leaders" that he meets. It has yet to mention the US Treasury action. Not that the ECF site or forum have either.

Agreed. Kirsan cancelled his trip to the United States and instead held an interview challenging the US Treasury Department's allegations, I'd have thought that inteview had enough positive spin for Kirsan to post on the FIDE website but even that seems too much like open speech for FIDE to allow.

[John McKenna]

Thanks for drawing attention to that Kirsan climb down.

I'd like to draw attention to this (from a previous Chessbase News) -

In an article this morning on the web site of the Russian Chess Federation Ilyumzhinov declares that he has no accounts abroad and is not afraid of provocations:


"I have a Sunday visit to the US, which will host the talks and the signing of a contract for the World Chess Championship in November next year in New York. The fact that they put me on the list – well, we will investigate that. I will go to the Ministry of Finance and ask them what they have against me, if they have questions. I was in Syria two years ago in Syria, and we held a children's tournament there. I met with the leadership of the country, but there are no commercial relations, no economic connections. I think this will not affect my work. The US Treasury has just recently frozen accounts, but I have accounts abroad, no, flats, yachts – nothing. I have not done anything against the United States, I have never stolen money from them, I have never sold weapons anywhere, my activity is open and I am not afraid of anything."

http://en.chessbase.com/post/us-sanctio ... -president

What led to him changing his plans, I wonder, was it cold legal advice in his ear or just a creeping cold feeling in his feet?

[Chris Rice]

My guess is that the airline would have informed him that he wouldn't be allowed to board the flight.

[John McKenna]

If so, "wings clipped"!

[Paolo Casaschi]

Where do these events leave the hope for the 2016 world championship to be held in the US?
I can't see Kirsan granting the world championship to a country he's not allowed to set foot on.

[Mick Norris]

Where do these events leave the hope for the 2016 world championship to be held in the US?
I can't see Kirsan granting the world championship to a country he's not allowed to set foot on.

There will be an open and transparent bidding process and the best bid will win

Carlsen seems to want to play in the US, so that may decide it whatever Kirsan wants

[Brian Towers]

I find it hard to understand how any member of NATO - even Turkey or Germany - could be regarded by Putin as an ally of any description.

If Turkey and Russia are not allies then I'm at a loss to understand the Turk Stream gas pipeline which Russia is (perhaps "was" would be more accurate) planning to build under the Black Sea to more easily supply Turkey with the more than 50% of its natural gas imports which Russia supplies. Similarly Russia has started work on the Akkuyu nuclear power plant in southern Turkey. This would have been Turkey's first nuclear power plant.

I can well understand why Russia rather than the US would build the Turk Stream gas pipeline but if Turkey is more strongly allied with the US then what is Russia doing building Turkey's first nuclear power plant? Why not the US?

As for Turkey being an ally of the US I think that even if Turkey is an ally in a kind of "Lyndon Baines Johnson" sort of way they are still struggling to find the tent flap. For a long time they refused permission for the US to use Turkish airbases to bomb one of the Turk's other allies, ISIS, and only relented when they were allowed to bomb one of the US's allies, the Kurds.