GM Alexandra Kosteniuk plans to characterize Switzerland for future chess occasions, a federation switch that’s more likely to begin on January 1, 2024. The information was revealed on the web site of the Swiss Chess Federation.
Kosteniuk stopped taking part in for her native nation Russia after the warfare in Ukraine broke out. The 38-year-old former girls’s world champion grew to become one of many first gamers to start out taking part in below the FIDE flag for that cause, however now she has determined to characterize Switzerland, the place she is already taking part in within the nationwide group championship.
Currently the world number-10 within the girls’s FIDE ranking checklist, Kosteniuk holds each a Russian and a Swiss passport, having been married to a Swiss individual for greater than a decade. Since 2015, she has been married to the Russian grandmaster Pavel Tregubov. The two stay in France.
It will take one other yr earlier than she will play for Switzerland and that’s for monetary causes, stated Peter Erismann, head of elite sport within the central board of the Swiss Chess Federation: “If she have been to vary federations now, the Swiss Chess Federation must pay the Russian Chess Federation a switch payment of $10,000. [In fact it’s 10,000 euros – PD.] After a two-year ready interval, altering federations is free.”
This two-year interval would begin in the intervening time Kosteniuk represented Russia for the final time in an official FIDE occasion, which was on the World Blitz Championships in December 2021. At least, that is what is usually recommended in paragraph 4.2 of the Transfer Regulations & Rules of Eligibility for Players (beneath), though it stays to be seen whether or not holding a passport will likely be thought of the identical as residency.
4.2 When the final illustration date is lower than 5 years previous to the switch date, then the eligibility date is about 2 years after graduation of residency within the new federation with out cost of the Transfer Fee and the Compensation Fee.
Kosteniuk will likely be by far the strongest participant on the Swiss girls’s group. Currently, the highest 4 feminine gamers within the nation are WGM Ghazal Hakimifard (2279), WIM Lena Georgescu (2262), WGM Monika Mueller-Seps (2237), and WIM Gundula Heinatz (2162).
With a ranking of 2519, Kosteniuk would presently be the sixth highest-rated participant in Switzerland, so it can’t be dominated out that she will likely be representing their group in open sections of e.g. the World Teams or the Olympiad. “We maintain the flexibleness to make use of her within the males’s nationwide group if there’s a want,” stated Erismann, who additionally talked about that she is planning to play within the 2023 Swiss Individual Championships this summer time.
Kosteniuk isn’t the one new participant within the Swiss girls’s group. The 15-year-old Mariya Manko (rated 2117) joins as effectively, and most certainly additionally the 18-year-old WIM Sofiia Hryzlova. Both are from Ukraine and fled with their household to Switzerland following the violence of their house nation.
For now, Kosteniuk had declined to remark.
