Putin Endorses Turlov for FIDE President
By Douglas C. · Sun, 20 Sep 2026
Russian independent outlet Agentstvo has reported that Vladimir Putin and Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev discussed the FIDE presidency directly during a bilateral meeting in Omsk in late July, and that Kirsan Ilyumzhinov's withdrawal from the race just two days later followed from that conversation.
Russian independent outlet Agentstvo has reported that Vladimir Putin and Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev discussed the FIDE presidency directly during a bilateral meeting in Omsk in late July, and that Kirsan Ilyumzhinov's withdrawal from the race just two days later followed from that conversation.What Agentstvo is claimingAccording to the outlet, Tokayev raised the FIDE election with Putin near the end of their July 24-25 meeting, telling him he had "only one request", that no Russian candidate compete for the presidency this autumn, clearing the way for Timur Turlov, the Kazakh billionaire who renounced his Russian citizenship in 2022. Putin reportedly agreed. Agentstvo attributes these details to two sources it describes as well-informed and close to the leadership of the Russian and Kazakh chess federations, and one source told the outlet that Putin likely didn't take much interest in who Turlov actually was, agreeing mainly as a courtesy to Tokayev. Ilyumzhinov, FIDE's former president and until that point one of the race's more prominent figures, withdrew from contention two days after the reported meeting.Why this deserves real scrutiny, not automatic acceptanceAgentstvo is a genuine, well-established independent Russian investigative outlet, one of several forced to operate from outside the country and designated a "foreign agent" by Russian authorities for its reporting on the Kremlin and Russian elites. That gives it real journalistic standing. But this specific claim rests entirely on two anonymous sources describing a private conversation between two heads of state, the kind of account that's inherently difficult to verify independently, and neither the Kremlin, Tokayev's office, Turlov's campaign, nor Ilyumzhinov has publicly confirmed or denied it as of this writing. It should be read as a credible, sourced claim from a serious outlet, not as an established fact.How it squares with what was already knownThe publicly stated reason for Ilyumzhinov's absence from the final candidate list was procedural: he had been counting on backing from the Russian Chess Federation, which was itself suspended by FIDE around the same period, leaving him unable to secure a qualifying nomination. Agentstvo's account doesn't necessarily contradict that timeline, a federation-level procedural obstacle and a political decision not to fight it could easily have happened together, but it does offer a considerably more deliberate explanation for why Ilyumzhinov stepped back exactly when he did, rather than treating his exit as simple bad luck with nomination paperwork.Why it matters regardless of how it's ultimately verifiedTurlov's candidacy has already faced sustained scrutiny this campaign over his citizenship documentation, his business ties, and his relationship with Kazakhstan's own government and chess federation. A credibly sourced claim that his path to the ballot traces back to a direct arrangement between Russia's and Kazakhstan's presidents adds a considerably heavier geopolitical dimension to that scrutiny, whether or not every detail holds up. With FIDE's own presidential vote now just days away in Samarkand, a story suggesting the field was shaped at the level of two heads of state, rather than through ordinary federation politics, is not something delegates are likely to simply set aside.