Ilyumzhinov commented on the 88th FIDE Congress that ended in Antalya late last week. Recall that his deputy Georgios Makropoulos was a main critic of the current head of federation.
In addition, at Executive Committee meeting, a vote was taken on the issue of Ilyumzhinov's non-participation in the next election. 37 delegates voted in favour and 20 voted against. However, as First Vice President of the Moscow Chess Federation Nikita Kim explained in an interview, this vote is nothing more than a private opinion of certain officials and has no legal consequences.
The same assessment of the situation was given by President of the Russian Chess Federation, Vice President of FIDE Andrei Filatov, who noted that Ilyumzhinov should make a decision himself whether to run for President or not.
Ilyumzhinov explained the intrigues of his colleagues by sanctions imposed on him by the US Treasury in November 2015.
Kirsan Nikolaevich said, about a month ago, he wrote a letter to US President Donald Trump with a request to protect his honour and dignity. And it had an effect. In recent days, Ilyumzhinov's lawyers have been in intensive contact with State Department officials on granting him an entry visa to the United States.
Ilyumzhinov also touched on the topic of chess general education expressing gratitude to Minister of Education and Science of the Russian Federation, Olga Vasilyeva for supporting the "Chess in schools" project and introducing chess as a compulsory lesson in all general educational establishments of the country.
Head of FIDE stressed that due to his constant meetings with heads of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation, today, the project is developing in Moscow as well as Leningrad, Moscow, Kaluga, Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Area regions and many others.