Press releases by the Russian Chess Federation
The Norwegian Chess Federation (NCF), one of the organizers of the World Chess Olympiad in the Norwegian city of Tromsø, has apologized to the Russian Chess Federation (RCF) and Russian national team for the situation that occurred one week prior to the start of the Olympiad in which the Russian women’s national team was not permitted to take part in the competition.
In a letter sent to the RCF, the Olympiad organizers expressed regret that this misunderstanding could have affected the preparation of the Russian chess players. The authors of the letter congratulated the Russian national team on its victory and expressed hope for further fruitful cooperation.
For its part, the RCF accepted the apologies of the Olympiad organizers. Thus, the conflict that arose just before the start of the tournament may be regarded as fully resolved.
Andrey Filatov, President of the Russian Chess Federation, has expressed his gratitude to the U.S. law firm Quinn Emanuel for assistance in resolving an incident with the Organizing Committee of the Tromsø 2014 Chess Olympiad, which illegitimately attempted to prohibit the Russian women’s national team from taking part in the key international chess tournament.
“We are grateful to the American lawyers from Quinn Emanuel for their prompt and highly professional work,” President of the Russian Chess Federation Andrey Filatov stressed. “Together we established a legal precedent that will serve as a good lesson in the future. Chess players from any national team must be confident that they are protected, while chess officials must act in strict accordance with legal norms and avoid arbitrariness. I would also like to say thank you to everyone who supported the Russian chess players in this situation during the competition. I am grateful to officials and rank and file representatives from the national federations of the United States, Canada, France, and many other countries for their kind words and moral support that we experienced over the course of all the difficult and tense days of the Olympiad.”
