Alleged Bulgarian cheating

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Letter to the Bulgarian chess federation from FIDE lawyers (sent on May 7)

I paraphrase: By email of March 27 and again April 21, you were informed the FIDE Anti-Cheating Commitee received a post-tournament complaint regarding Ivan Tetimov.... You were requested to provide his contact details so the Investigatory Chamber could reach him... Danailov responded: BCF has no intention to collaborate with current FIDE management (not competent nor professional enough)... Article 2.4 of the FIDE Statutes say members must obey... The FIDE Anti-Cheating Guidelines further provide that national federations are required to cooperate with the Investigatory Chamber. ... Article 2.5 of FIDE Statutes says that federations which do not comply can be temporarily excluded [even by just the Presidential Board] ... we give you until May 11 at the latest...

Well, the ACC Guidelines are on thin statutory grounds in the FIDE world, due to the lack of General Assembly quorum in Tromso -- they were only passed later by the Presidential board. Note that the BCF did in fact get the CAS to annul (amendments to) Statutes 13.5 and 13.6 a few years ago (though they seem to still show up in the FIDE Handbook). So one can expect it will end up at the CAS in the end.

A bit more info at: http://chess-news.ru/en/node/18954

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Danailov even directly tweets: The only place for communication with Makro&friends "FIDE" is Court of Arbitration for Sport. Note that if the FIDE Presidential Board acts, one presumably must exhaust the internal remedy of putting it before the next General Assembly prior to appealing to the CAS.

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Danailov's latest tweet: Keeping my word
No actual information on this appeal (May 7) to the CAS, or exactly what it is about.

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Danailov keeps up his Twitter banter regarding the CAS: Twitter banter: I am curious what CAS will decide about the jurisdiction of @Fide_chess Ethic Commission.Have they the right to judge ECU President?Will see

Not sure what he means (Danailov was the ECU President 2010-14, but now Azmaiparashvili is). Maybe his recent CAS appeal is regarding something involving Azmai? Anyway, the FIDE Ethics Code (9.1.4) lists it as applying to: FIDE office bearer; member federations, delegates and counselors; affiliated organisations; sponsors/organisers; and competitors in FIDE registered tournaments. The ECU is an affiliated organisation of FIDE. Neither the 2014 Tromso report nor the 2013 Tallinn report of the EC seems to mention either Danailov or Azmaiparashvili, so I am not sure what EC judgement might be being appealed to the CAS (if this is indeed what Danailov means)?

My educated guess is that an action against Danailov (regarding his acts as ECU president) was brought before the EC, which determined that it had jurisdiction (and thus opened a case against him), and Danailov is already appealing [to the CAS within 21 days] the decision on this part of the procedure. [See 4.5 and 4.6 of the FIDE Code of Ethics: Any decisions made by the Ethics Commission may be the object of appeal arbitration proceedings ...] There is also 2.2.2: Office bearers who through their behavior no longer inspire the necessary confidence or have in other ways become unworthy of trust, though my interpretation is that refers to FIDE office bearers. [Incidentally, Levy's notes from his EC presentation have Rivello starting the meeting by saying that the EC was reducing the cause to 2.2.3 (impartiality and responsibilty of directors/organisers), though of course the catch-all 2.2.10 was applied in the end].

Note that 2.2.1 includes: Fraudulence in the administration of any FIDE office or national federation office that affects other federations. In the Morocco arbiter's case (3/2006), this is what allowed the president to also be brought before the EC. Note that the Rybka complaint did not include Levy as a respondent, and the ICGA is not a "national federation" but an affiliated organisation.

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My educated guess is that an action against Danailov (regarding his acts as ECU president) was brought before the EC ...

Note that Danailov, as the Continental President for Europe, was also (Statute 1.3.1h) a "FIDE official". I am not sure whether an "official" is exactly the same as an "office bearer" (in the CoE) or not, but I would guess that it is for the purposes here. In another place, the CoE says (4.4): Appeals against decision taken by any FIDE official can be submitted to the FIDE Ethics Commission, though if that is operative I'm not sure what decision of Danailov's is being appealed against.

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ChessVibes has a report, first noting the Cheating accusations, then giving the background for the recently entered CAS appeal.

n the fall of 2014, the Ethics Commission had received complaints from the European Chess Union (under a new administration since August 2014) and the Montenegro Chess Federation concerning the organization of the 2013 European Youth Chess Championship in Budva, Montenegro.

In these complaints, Danailov, together with Vladimir Sakotic (then ECU Executive Directory) and Sava Stoisavljevic (then ECU Secretary), were accused of violating clauses of the FIDE Code of Ethics related to fraud, untrustful behavior, partiality, and reputation damage.

On December 15, 2014, the Ethics Commission ruled that for three of the four clauses, the complaints were “admissible,” i.e. the EC was going to deal with the matter. This decision was later formally motivated, on April 15.

Through a Bulgarian law firm, Danailov together with Sakotic and Stoisavljevic have now appealed at CAS that the complaints are admissible. The three argue that the Ethics Commission's decision is “unfounded and contradictory to FIDE Statute, and also delivered in abuse of [the three's] right to be heard and right of fair process.”

According to Danailov/Sakotic/Stoisavljevic, the Ethics Commission “has neither direct nor indirect (extended) jurisdiction to resolve on the issues raised in the complaints, it has no instruments to adjudicate on them (...) and the complaints are inadmissible as not falling within the range of the misconduct or actions determined in Clause 2 of FIDE Code of Ethics.”

In a reaction, two members of the FIDE Ethics Commission stated that they had not been informed about the appeal at CAS. It is “a procedure which in my view is not open to them until conclusion of the whole case,” wrote EC Chairman Francois Strydom in an email.

“As far I know [Danailov] is invited to defend himself [in] front of [the] ECU board next month in Romania... So why all this noise?” wrote EC member Willy Iclicki.

This is wrong. I have nothing to defend because I did nothing wrong, nor [did my] my colleagues. It's more that I am very proud of what we did for chess in the European Parliament and Unesco during our term. Things FIDE can only dream of. If I go to Bucharest to offer a peaceful solution for one unnecessary conflict started and created by them without fundament [foundation], it is going nowhere.

I went to CAS for a question of principles. In my opinion the FIDE Ethics commission have no jurisdiction to judge the ECU president and shouldn't accept such a case. The ECU needs to have its own ethics commission or another way to punish its members if they consider them guilty, but they can't deliver the case to FIDE EC ever.

Also,I doubt very much of the objectivity and independence of one of FIDE EC members, Willy Iclicki. This person was boycotting our work in the ECU on purpose during the last four years and hates us personally.

The ECU is a completely independent organization with its own statutes and has nothing to do with FIDE.

The problem is that the current FIDE management, which I call Makro & friends “FIDE”, consider themselves as owners of FIDE and the chess world and can't stand any opposition with independent thinking. Right now I am the only opposition existing and they are fighting against me with all FIDE machine power using all kind of measures. They eliminated Karpov and Kasparov and I am the last one, there is nobody else left.

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Here is a 2014 interview with Iclicki, that indicates some of the background about his complaints with the ECU under Danailov (note that Iclicki was in fact the campaign manager for Danailov's opponent [Azmaiparashvili] in the 2014 elections).

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Another EC member, Dobronateanu, was on the ECU ticket with Azmaiparashvili in 2014 (and is thus now ECU Deputy President). This was not a sufficient reason for him to be recused in Kasparov/Leong, though if Danailov is a principal the situation may differ (not completely related, but Wilkinson was a candidate with Kasparov/Leong and recused himself). In reality, I would say there are just too many people involved wearing multiple hats in FIDE (for instance, Iclicki was the FIDE Treasurer back in 90s). The EC is elected by the GA directly, and usually only 2 or 3 of the 5 have relevant legal expertise, the others largely being chess politicians to some degree.

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Trying to keep all straight: Dobronateanu was an ECU vice president under Danailov from 2010, he then won the Deputy President position on the opposing ticket in 2014. Given that the ECU is listed as being one of the bringers of the EC action, it is quite logical that he recused himself.

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Here is a 2014 interview with Iclicki, that indicates some of the background about his complaints with the ECU under Danailov (note that Iclicki was in fact the campaign manager for Danailov's opponent [Azmaiparashvili] in the 2014 elections).

And Iclicki is indeed in the Ethics Commission.

If he is part of the panel treating the Danailov case, then that is clearly wrong.

Even if he is not, as a member of the EC he has no business making statements like these:

“As far I know [Danailov] is invited to defend himself [in] front of [the] ECU board next month in Romania... So why all this noise?” wrote EC member Willy Iclicki.

And I understand from you that Dobronauteanu also has a direct interest. It would be interesting to know the composition of the EC in Dainalov's case. But let me guess... it's the five from the EC's web page?