Aronyan will play in Kazan instead of Baku

The championship that will decide who are eligible to take part in the FIDE World Chess Championship will not take place in Baku but rather in the Russian city of Kazan as announced before, FIDE has decided.

According to local Armenian sports news website Armsport.am among those players eligible to this competition are Levon Aronyan (Armenia), Teymur Rajabov (Azerbaijan), Vladimir Kramnik (Russia), Magnus Carlsen (Norway), Veselin Topalov (Bulgaria) , Boris Gelfand (Israel), Gata Kamsky (US) and Shahriar Mamadyarov (Azerbaijan).

Recently Russia's Chess Federation had proposed the FIDE to change the venue of this championship, as the Armenian grand master Levon Aronyan was categorically against going to Baku - something he has said for several times.

But this does not seem to have solved the problem. Even worse it has created another one. Bulgarian chess player Veselin Topalov in turn has now said that he will not go to Kazan pointing to a previous row over a disputed match with Kramnik who, according to Topalov, was being prompted how to play at that notorious match.

FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov is going to send a letter to Topalov and ask him to reconsider his decision.