Bengaluru: The clash between Freestyle Chess, backed by Magnus Carlsen, and the chess governing body Fide is heating up. Jan Buettner, the promoter of Freestyle Chess and a German entrepreneur, has sent an open letter claiming that Fide's objections are driven by financial motives and that they don’t have exclusive rights to the term "world."

The main issue at hand is the use of the term ‘World Championship’ for Freestyle events. Fide insists it has the sole authority to organize ‘World Championships in chess. Buettner clarified, “Our tour isn’t a ‘World Championship’ in the usual sense. It’s called the ‘Freestyle Grand Slam Chess Tour.’ Each year, we name a champion in Freestyle Chess, which may evolve into new formats beyond Chess960, but it won’t be classical chess. The title of ‘world champion’ here highlights the unique nature of our events, not a challenge to Fide’s traditional World Championship cycle,” he stated in his letter to Fide CEO Emil Sutovsky.

The Freestyle Grand Slam Chess Tour is set to kick off its first event of the year in Weissenhaus, Germany next month, featuring six of the current top 10 players in the world.

Buettner described the partnership between Freestyle Chess and FIDE as “increasingly strained.” He pointed out that FIDE president Arkady Dvorkovich invited Carlsen and Fabiano Caruana to participate in a Freestyle Chess Summit in Singapore around the World Championship, but when they arrived, they were “stonewalled and ignored.”

The letter further stated that FIDE has taken a “confrontational” approach towards players. Freestyle’s offer of $100,000 a year to FIDE as a goodwill gesture to prevent harassment was turned down. Buettner claimed that FIDE’s “unjustifiable” request for $500,000 indicates that “monetary gain is the primary driver.”

He emphasized that “Freestyle seeks peace not conflict” and expressed their willingness to contribute $50,000 annually to ensure that “players are left undisturbed.”

Just hours before Buettner dropped his open letter, Fide CEO Sutovsky fired off a heated post on X, taking a strong stance against Freestyle Chess and its so-called ‘leaders.’ He accused them of riding the coattails of last year's classical World Championship's “publicity and budget,” claiming their own World Championship ambitions just suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

“Why not just run your series peacefully instead of trying to create a rift in the chess community? Is it about personal ambition, or do you think ‘World Championship’ sounds better? If that’s the case, it’s not going to fly.” Sutovsky argued that “money is clearly the main goal” behind the Freestyle Chess commercial venture. “You’re ignoring the broader chess community, catering to a select few, and for that, you’re ready to go to war…We’re open to collaborating with any private project, especially the ambitious ones…But if you’re looking for a fight, bring it on.”

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