Press release to journalists attending the World Championship

I would like to inform that the latest press release of Team Topalov is obviously nothing else than another attempt to create a certain picture of Vladimir Kramnik.

This press release lacks any scientific basis and therefore can not be taken seriously from anybody who has a certain knowlegde of chess and computers but it intends to influence the mass media by throwing a shadow on the image of Vladimir Kramnik.

The whole strategy of Team Topalov is obviously based to indirectly insult or to indirectly accuse Vladimir Kramnik of cheating without showing any evidance.

The members of Team Kramnik and with us the whole world of chess feels ashamed for the absolutely unethical behaviour of Team Topalov.

Foreseeing such activities of Team Topalov, I already requested yesterday additional measures to the WCC organisation in order to avoid this as much as possible.

In the meanwhile the entire Kramnik Team feels deeply insulted in conjunction with all these activities of the Topalov team. We think it is a shame and we ask herewith FIDE President H.E. Kirsan Iljumshinov to start certain measures. In accordance with the press release of the Association of Chess Professionals we would kindly request a detailed investigation of the FIDE Ethics Commission. We hope that all events from the WCC 2006 at Elista will be inspected. The result and measures should be presented to the chess community asap because we are increasingly concerned that the professional chess world will be seriously damaged if this can not be stopped.

With best regards,

Carsten Hensel
Manager to Vladimir Kramnik, Classical World Chess Champion