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OPEN LETTER sent by E-mail
to all delegates to the FIDE-Congress Action Committee for a Democratic FIDE an independent Think-Tank devoted to the future of chess and FIDE (to be incorporated on 01 January 2005 as a charity in the Netherlands).
Villa Wadwerda, Wadwerderweg 89 Our temporary website Action Committee for a Democratic FIDE, a dedicated website strictly devoted to FIDE - Reform will be appear on the internet after the Chess Olympics. Yours sincerely, Kaarlo Schepel – spokesperson
To the most esteemed delegates at the General Assembly in Calvia Leading a series of important meetings is an art. Books have been written about it. As an independent Think-Tank without an agenda of our own, we like to alert you to a few extremely worrying points relating to the official agenda. We want you to be armed with the right questions, so that a vigorous discussion can be held in the committee meetings in the coming three days. And that the right reports are submitted to the General Assembly for the final three days. The person who writes the Agenda actually controls it. This was the case in the Campomanes Presidency days, which - despite bringing a lot of positive things - led to the split that still exists in FIDE. The agenda was always overloaded, and the current agenda has the same trade marks. Overmore, several very important issues, if not essential ones are missing. We want you to fully aware of this, as it distorts or omits at least one of the most important issues: the credibility of the President. We encourage you to ask these questions: (1) The motion of No-Confidence was sent by the United States Chess Federation (USCF) to FIDE in May well in advance of the deadline. It has now not been included, and the FIDE office claims that this is because they did not receive an answer to some clarifying e-mails to the USCF. We have this from an impeccable source.
These things happen in FIDE, and the idea, as we understand the matter, will be to issue a last-minute addendum, if that. There will then be a call to put off consideration of the issue so that FIDE delegates can survey the opinions of their home federations, since the motion was left off the agenda.
Here is the precise wording of the motion:
"We express dismay at how FIDE is managed and if at the time of the Congress if President Ilyumzhinov has failed to meet his financial obligations to FIDE, in full, we vote no confidence in the Presidency."
It is a two part motion, the dismay part which had no conditions and the conditional part that seems to have been satisfied. However, that is not up to them to decide and unilaterally remove the motion from the agenda. The complete motion must remain on the agenda and when it come up it can be modified by removing the conditional part.
(2) The FIDE-Commerce issue. Although it is entirely possible that His Excellency Kirsan Ilyumzhinov will touch upon it in his speech to Assembly in his annual report, we, however, have severe reservations. He nor his associates ever reacted to our Confidential Letter dated 13th of August, nor to our relevations about the fact that FIDE-Commerce was closed down by the Official Receiver's Office in the United Kingdom. Please note that the application to close it down dated from less than a month before the Bled General Assembly, and the actual closing down one month after the President and his Board were re-elected. This could be called being extremely economical with the truth. No one in FIDE went public with it until it was revealed less than two months ago! We attach the text (slightly edited to protect innocent parties) at the bottom of this e-mail under Appendix 1. Please also note that Fide-Commerce received an exclusive contract by the Istanbul General Assembly in 2000, to last until 2017, with an option to renew it in that year until 2027!!.
You can find it back both on our own website and on the following addresses: http://www.chessville.com/News/FinalReportAboutFIDEReform.htm and http://www.chessville.com/News/EulogyDemiseFIDECommerce.htm
It now is available too for Russian speakers on the following addresses: http://www.chess-players.org/rus/news/viewarticle.html?id=222 and http://www.chess-players.org/rus/news/viewarticle.html?id=220
(3) We like His Excellency to public declare his current relationship with his (former) close associate Artem Tarasov, who had a 30% interest in FIDE-Commerce and was the CEO. He recently wrote and had published a 'kiss-and-tell-all' account called 'The Millionaire' with his own associates under the Yeltsin Russia. Details can be found on the following pages: http://www.mosnews.com/news/2004/09/24/tarasov.shtml
(4) Is it true that the President has not fulfilled his financial obligations over the past two years? He was re-elected mainly on the fact that (a) he had done just that until Bled 2002; and (b) the Prague agreement. One of our correspondents notes:
Kirsan didn't fund the last KO in June. (a) Is it true that Karpov, Kasparov and Kramnik jointly sought an audience with the FIDE President to talk about the future of the World Championship and the relationship between professional players and FIDE, but were refused an appointment? (b) Is it true that the FIDE-office requested 20 luxury hotel rooms to attend the failed title fight Kasparov-Ponomariov? It should be clear that adding such a burden to a potential sponsor does not make many friends.
(6) There are two bids to host the 2008 Chess Olympics, by Dresden (Germany) and Tallinn (Estonia). The latter was the losing candidate against Turin 2006 in Bled. We would applaud if the losing candidate this time will be given a three months lasting first option period to accept hosting the 2010 Chess Olympics. These are two good candidates, and both deserve a chance.
The reason we say this is that reports have reached us that the bid of one party has already been sown up (alleged backroom dealing). As you know, it is difficult for people in the know (having direct evidence) to come forward for fear of being ostracised. We consider these sources very credible. We do not favour one party or the other, and will not tell the details. However, we ask the General Assembly that they order the two bidding federations to put their own house in order. The German federation (DSB) e.g. fulfilled its financial obligations to the silver winning German team of Istanbul more than one year late, and is openly boasting in writing (sample available) that the German diplomatic mission overseas have won support for the Dresden bid. This does not exactly invite confidence about reliability of agreements made nor of tact and diplomacy. The Estonian federation e.g. openly discriminates against its own Russian-speaking minority chess players (including children of any age!).
(7) Could the President report on veracities about his involvement in dealing in Iraqi oil despite the U.N. embargo? Could he now also finally explain to the General Assembly why he still keeps his declaration of friendship to Saddam Hussein on his website? We ask our readers to visit the following website http://kirsan.kalmykia.ru/engl/friends2.htm There is a lot of misinformation on the internet, and we do not want to add to these. But this is the president own website and these are reports by recognised Moscow newspapers that would be sued, censored or even closed down unless they could back up their stories. We know that even Bobby Fischer was investigated by both the FBI and the KGB. We would not expect much less of some powerful Russian politicians. However, we object that the president of FIDE acts in this way. Let him clarify. We quote:
http://www.mosnews.com/news/2004/10/08/iraq.shtml
For reference we added some of the translated text in appendix 2.
(8) We note that the FIDE-management is completely unrepentent about the Drug-Testing issue, and still pushed these regulations through over well-founded and argumented objections (please refer to our website www.kaarloschepel.nl ). We as players are told that this is to comply with the Olympic movement. It would not be a bad idea if the FIDE-top then also complied with the rules of the IOC, and 'retires' people who are indicted or convicted of fraud and other misdimeanors. Several IOC - delegates had to retire after Salt Lake City or even went to jail.
(9) We also noted with interest that Laos and Taiwan are about to be given (full) member status. Although we applaud that they want to join FIDE, can these federations tell us how many clubs and members they have? We think that the Thai chess variation played in Laos is a recognised sport or mindgame there, and so is Chinese chess in Taiwan. But we want to know the full membership details about our own international chess. Accepting them as full members means giving them a vote that is just as important as the one of e.g. Russia, Germany or Spain. May we refer to our earlier proposals.
We are ready to add to our previous proposals on the issue of larger, smaller and minute federations with an important qualifying statement. Anyone interested, please send us an e-mail.
And finally (10) We are glad that the FIDE-trainers committee is discussing in "Annex 42 - the draft budget for the FIDE Trainer Berlin Academy for 2004-2006." However, we question whether this will really benefit the thousands of eager chess players and teachers who do not have an Elo 2,300 rating. Will this be an exclusive deal? As both Berlin and Athens are located in the European Union, this initiative has to comply with the EU guidelines on competition.
We could cite a lot more questions that need answering. All we ask is that FIDE which has the slogan GENS UNA SUMUS will respect the general ethical rules about a fair playing field for all concerned, will become more transparent and holds those that the General Assembly has elected will comply with the highest ethical standards.
kaarlo schepel - spokesperson for Action Committee for a Democratic FIDE an independent Think-Tank devoted to the future of chess and FIDE (to be incorporated on 01 January 2005 as a charity in the Netherlands).
Appendix 1: Dear Grandmaster ( ...... confidential ...), did you know that the company "FIDE Commerce International Ltd."(Company-No. 4023838) is/was liquidated ("compulsory liquidation")? Source: http://www.companieshouse.gov.uk/info Name & Registered Office: FIDE COMMERCE INTERNATIONAL LIMITED CITYGATE BUILDING, SOUTHAMPTON STREET, READING RG1 2QU Status :Liquidation Company No.:04023838 Date of Incorporation: 26/06/2000 Country of Origin : United Kingdom Company Type: Private Limited Company Nature Of Business (SIC(92)): 7414 - Business & management consultancy Accounting Reference Date: 31/12 Last Accounts Made Up To: 31/12/2000 (TOTAL EXEMPTION SMALL) Next Accounts Due: 31/10/2002 OVERDUE Last Return Made Up To: 26/06/2001 Next Return Due: 24/07/2002 OVERDUE Last Members List: 26/06/2001 Insolvency History Company Name: FIDE COMMERCE INTERNATIONAL LIMITED Company Number: 04023838 Number of Cases:1 To obtain details of the practitioner click on the appropriate case type description. Case Number: 1 (of 1 cases) > > Case Type: COMPULSORY LIQUIDATION > > Order to Wind Up: 11/12/2002 Petition Date: 22/10/2002 Practitioner name: OR London, The Official Receiver Practitioner address: 21 Bloomsbury Street, London WC1B 3SS "compulsory liquidation": http://ws2.companieshouse.gov.uk/notes/gbw1.html Whois Lookup: FIDECOMMERCE.COM (...) Administrative Contact: ( ... confidential ...) Registrar of Record: TUCOWS, INC. Record last updated on 01-Oct-2002. Record expires on 01-Oct-2003. Record Created on 01-Oct-2002.
Appendix 2:
The CIA confirmed a report made by the
U.S.-led Iraq Survey Group that © October, 2004 Action Committee for a Democratic FIDE, Kaarlo Schepel – spokesperson
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