Fed Up with Politics, Iran's Chess Prodigy Will Compete for Another Country
Independent Aggregator of Iran-related News/Events, Kodoom.com: According to Chess.com, Iran's 16-year-old Chess prodigy and Grandmaster, Alireza Firouzja (FIDE rating of 2723, Iran's top ranked and the world’s number two junior player) has announced he will change his nationality after the Iranian chess federation banned him from the upcoming World Rapid & Blitz in Moscow. The federation had objected to Parham Maghsoodloo and Amin Tabatabaei, two other Iranian Grandmasters, playing games against Israeli opponents in a recent blitz tournament. Despite their victory over Israeli opponents, both Grandmasters were reprimanded in Iran because of the hardliners' policy of not recognizing Israel as a legitimate government, but an occupied land (news source). Subsequently, the federation decided to withdraw participation of all Iranian players from the World Rapid & Blitz, but Firouzja did not go along with this decision.
Firouzja is currently living in France and may want to play under the French or U.S. flag.
Another female Iranian Chess Player defied Iranian rules and appeared in the Moscow tournament without Hijab (news link).
Referring to Saeid Mollaei, Iran's top Judo athlete, The Independent mentions Firouzja would be the second Iranian sports figure to try to renounce his citizenship in recent months over pressures on Iranian athletes to boycott matches with Israeli competitors. Iranian authorities ordered Mollaei to intentionally lose in the semi-final at the Tokyo 2019 World Championships, so as to avoid a potential match in the finals against Israeli 2019 world champion Sagi Muki. In reaction, saying he was afraid to return to Iran after exposing and criticizing its pressure on him to deliberately lose in the World Championships, in August 2019 he moved to Europe with a two-year visa from Germany, and in December 2019 he became a citizen of Mongolia. Mollaei will reportedly arrive in Israel in January 2020 to compete at the Tel Aviv Grand Prix.
Politicization of sports has cost Iran in other areas too. In football (soccer), several prominent international coaches from Turkey, Italy and Germany have been forced to leave Iran in disgraceful conditions in recent months because the state-run teams could not pay them in the aftermath of Trump-imposed sanctions and shortage of foreign currency. Many Iranian football teams are not commercially viable and run as strategic or national security mechanisms.
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