Freestyle tour boss, Magnus Carlsen call for Fide president’s resignation

PARIS – Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour boss Jan Henric Buettner and all-time great Magnus Carlsen have called on International Chess Federation (Fide) president Arkady Dvorkovich to resign, after talks over an agreement about the new series fell through.

In January, Fide warned the Freestyle Chess Players Club, which is co-owned by Buettner and Carlsen, that they should not brand the series as a “World Championship”.

Buettner said he negotiated with Dvorkovich until the early hours of Feb 3, only to hear from the president that the Fide council would not agree to a deal.

“He should just go away. They’re a completely incompetent and amateur organisation,” German entrepreneur Buettner told Reuters on Feb 4.

In messages exchanged with Henrik Carlsen, father and manager of the five-time classical chess champion, which Reuters has seen, Dvorkovich wrote that he would resign if players would be affected in any way by their participation in the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour, which starts in Weissenhaus, Germany, on Feb 7.

“They can decide on their own and Fide will not take any negative action,” one of the messages read. “I will step down if my word will be undermined by the council.”

However, the Fide council said in a statement on Feb 3 that players willing to take part in the series are required to sign a “waiver note” by 6pm Central European Time, Feb 4 (1am, Feb 5, Singapore time), to remain eligible for the official Fide World Championship cycle.

It added: “This document does not impose new requirements on the players but provides them with a one-off exception from their existing contractual obligations towards Fide.”

Buettner said: “We removed any reference to the world championship on our website. We’re moving on, we’re leaving them in the dust. They gave us great PR.”

Carlsen and Buettner, however, asked that Dvorkovich keep his promise even though the waiver “is not required any more”, Fide chief executive Emil Sutovsky told Reuters on Feb 4, after references to a “world championship” were removed from the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam’s website.

“He said if I’m not getting the council’s approval I’m going to resign, so where is the resignation?” Buettner said.

On X, Carlsen wrote: “By forcing players to sign an unacceptable waiver you have reneged on your promise. Will you resign?”

Chess960, created by former world champion Bobby Fischer in 1996, has been gaining in popularity after an invitational tournament played in 2024 at the Weissenhaus Luxury Resort, which hosted the G7 Foreign Minister summit in 2022.

In Chess960/freestyle chess, the pieces on the back rank are reshuffled, meaning that computer-backed preparations leading to sometimes dull openings, are meaningless.

While Fide has organised world championships in 2019 and 2022, they were played in rapid time control, and the 2024 edition was cancelled. REUTERS