Horse crossing – Newspaper Kommersant No. 35 (7480) dated 03/01/2023

The Chess Federation of Russia (RCF) has become the first domestic sports structure, which, against the backdrop of sanctions imposed in connection with a special military operation in Ukraine, changed its geographical “registration”. The Asian Chess Federation (ACF) overwhelmingly approved the decision to join the CFR, whose leaders are confident that Russian chess players will have more quality game practice in the new region than in Europe.

The issue of accepting the Russian Chess Federation into the Asian Chess Federation was central at the regular ACF Continental Assembly in Abu Dhabi. As a result, the vast majority of delegates – 29 – spoke in favor of joining the FSR. Six functionaries abstained, and only one vote was cast against joining.

FSR President Andrey Filatov called the incident a “historic event.”

Indeed, there have been no cases of a strong national chess federation changing its geographical “registration” until now. The distribution of votes, according to Mr. Filatov, “speaks, on the one hand, of trust” in the FSR, and on the other hand, of the work “well done” by the federation. Andrey Filatov, in his statement, expressed hope “for further fruitful cooperation” with the ACF, “for the participation of Russian teams in the continental championship and the holding of Asian competitions on the territory of Russia, which has successfully hosted tournaments of the highest level many times and has all the necessary infrastructure for this.” Formally, a full-fledged member of the Asian Federation of the FSHR (its transition from under the auspices of the European Chess Union (ECU) was previously approved by both the ECU itself and the International Chess Federation (FIDE)) will become from May 1.

The fact that the head of the Russian chess structure intends to leave the ECU in order to join the ACF, she announced back in April last year. Over the past few months, the idea, as it turned out, has not lost its relevance. Explaining its meaning, Russian chess officials pointed to the situation in which the FSR found itself.

In Russian chess, it is formally a little more privileged than in the vast majority of sports. FIDE never introduced absolute isolation for them. Only Russian teams were suspended.

Individually, chess players from Russia, albeit in a neutral status, are still allowed to participate in international competitions.

However, representatives of the FSR spoke about the fact that in reality the policy of the ECU, which de jure adheres to the same sanctions measures as FIDE, as well as its member countries, was aimed at “hard limiting” the admission of Russians to competitions held in Europe, without a doubt that in Asia there will be fewer problems “both with logistics and with the attitude towards domestic athletes.” At the same time, the leaders of the federation pointed to the “saturation” of the Asian sports calendar, which is in no way inferior to the European one in this sense, as well as the extremely high level of competition in the region. Recently, Asia in men’s chess has indeed noticeably surpassed Europe and America in terms of the number of bright young talents, while in women’s it is, in fact, about its dominance.

The FSR is the first Russian sports structure that has chosen the “Asian option” in the search for the best options for development in the current specific conditions.

But we can assume that sooner or later other organizations will follow its example.

This option appeared on the agenda of the Russian Olympic Committee in January, after the Olympic Council of Asia issued a statement in which it expressed its readiness to allow athletes from Russia and Belarus to participate in tournaments under its auspices. It followed a resonant publication by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). In it, the IOC, which immediately after the start of a special military operation in Ukraine, in fact, initiated the introduction of a regime of complete international isolation in relation to the Russian sports industry, for the first time spoke in favor of its sharp easing. The new recommendations insist on ensuring the admission to the competition of Russian and Belarusian athletes who refrain from “active support” of the special operation.

And at the end of last year, the “Asian theme” was raised by the Russian Football Union (RFU). He raised the question of the expediency of withdrawing from the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA), which, it seems, is not going to cancel the suspension of Russian clubs and teams from tournaments in the near future, for the sake of moving to the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) for discussion by the executive committee. Instead of sanctioning the transition, the RFU, however, created a working group for interaction with UEFA. However, in February, the president of the organization, Alexander Dyukov, and its general secretary, Maxim Mitrofanov, attended the AFC congress in Manama at the invitation of the head of the regional confederation, Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim al-Khalifa. At the same time, the main RFU team has been playing exclusively with Asian rivals for a long time. Last fall, the Russian national team met in friendly matches with the national teams of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, and its game with the Iranians was scheduled for March 23.

Alexey Dospekhov