About Kirsan Ilyumzhinov
Kirsan Nikolayevich Ilyumzhinov (born 5 April 1962) is a Russian oligarch, administrator and politician. He was President of the Republic of Kalmykia in the Russian Federation from 1993 to 2010, and was president of FIDE, the chess international governing body, from 1995 to 2018. He has also been at the forefront of promoting chess in schools in Russia and overseas. He is the founder of Novy Vzglyad publishing house. He has been an honorary president of the former Kalmykian FC Uralan. == Personal life == Ilyumzhinov was born in Elista, Kalmykia. His parents were subject to the Kalmyk deportations of 1943 when the entire Kalmyk population was deported to Siberia – Kirsan's own family had an impeccable record fighting the Germans (he was named after a great-uncle who served in the Red Army during the Russian Civil War and committed suicide after having been ordered to execute large numbers of captured Whites). He grew up in Elista, after the Kalmyks were allowed to return following Stalin's death. From a young age he became interested in chess, and he won the Kalmykian national chess championship in 1976 at the age of 14. From 1979 to 1980 Ilyumzhinov worked as a mechanic-fitter at the Zvezda plant in Elista.
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