4 min readApr 7, 2026 06:11 PM IST
FIDE CEO Emil Sutovsky has said that India’s top female chess player Koneru Humpy will not be fined or sanctioned for her last-minute withdrawal from the Candidates chess tournament at Cyprus. Humpy had pulled out of the prestigious tournament just days before the event citing security concerns related to Israel and the USA’s war with Iran.
Humpy’s concerns were rooted in an incident at the start of the war when a drone hit a British airbase in Cyprus. Humpy was replaced by Ukrainian grandmaster Anna Muzychuk.
The official FIDE regulations noted that any player who withdraws from the Candidates without a valid reason after signing the contract could be fined up to €10,000. Sutovsky said that Humpy would not face any sanctions.
“We are not going to find her or take her under any sanctions because quitting the tournament was not based just on nothing, it was based on some real concerns. But I think it was just taken out of proportion,” Sutovsky told Chessbase India in an interview.
He then said while no other players besides Humpy had raised safety concerns about playing in Cyprus, he had tried to convince Humpy before she made the decision.
“I spoke to Humpy herself when she raised concerns. We are old-time friends, and I’m full of admiration for her. Humpy is a legend. But I think her call here was her right,” said Sutovsky before adding: “I feel sorry for her decision, but if we were taking a decision to shift every time when a player exhibits even a motivated concern about this or that matter, then we wouldn’t be able to ever pull big events one after another. No other player exhibited the concern. We have no cancellation not only from players but also from media or members of the FIDE council. The entire FIDE team was here. It’s not like FIDE said, ‘okay guys you come there and we will rest at our homes.’ Everybody was here. Humpy decided what she decided. It doesn’t make me think of her any less. But I think this call objectively was not motivated by sufficient grounds due to how the situation is.”
He then lashed out at people on social media who were raising concerns about player safety. He clarified that the comments were not aimed at Humpy, but at social media warriors.
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“I don’t like this narrative where people in comments come, ‘safety is first.’ Why is safety first? Maybe freedom is first in your life. Maybe your dreams are first in your life. Maybe something that drives you is first in your life. If safety is first, lock yourself at home. I don’t just accept that safety first is a priority because it’s not clear what is first in this life. In this case, I think the concerns were not in correspondence with reality. If we speak about the likelihood of (the venue) being damaged by something, it comes from so many possibilities. The likelihood of a drone arriving three or four weeks before you take a decision — and it’s a drone, once again, not like ballistic rockets that attacked Cyprus. Everybody is living a normal life here… We also took precautions; all the players were informed about what kind of precautions we took. You cannot postpone such an event because you just can’t remove it without any good reason.”
