It is common knowledge that there is great tension both on and off the board between the two big Ks of chess, namely Gary Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov. Although they can be civil to one another in public, there is no denying that they have a mutual dislike for each other.
In the past two or three years, another player with a surname beginning with K has entered the picture to complicate matters: Gata Kamsky.
Now, Karpov and Kamsky are supposed to play in the World Chess Federation's version of the world chess championship match this year, and the winner will then meet Kasparov, the Professional Chess Association's world champion, in a match to unify the two titles.
Unfortunately, the FIDE world championship match has hit some snags - the difficulty in raising funds is one - and the date has been pushed forward to next year.
Karpov has charged that there were three Russian cities willing to host the FIDE match but their interests were torpedoed by the Russian Chess Federation president who is a known Kasparov supporter.
Karpov thus has reasons to believe that there is a conspiracy to prevent this match from ever taking place. But this conspiracy theory does not seem to be reasonable if the PCA has reportedly forwarded to FIDE a proposal for the unification match.
For this unification match, the winner of the FIDE world title match would have to agree to play with the PCA champion but according to Kasparov, both Karpov and Kamsky have refused to sign the proposal.
So far, the quarrel has been limited to within FIDE and to a lesser extent, the PCA. More recently, however, other parties have been dragged into the dispute.
Linares is a small Spanish town where hardly anything exciting ever happens. It boasts only one hotel, and that is the extent of its tourist industry. But at least once a year, a local businessman named Luis Rentero pours in money to hold a tournament and the town wakes up to an influx of top-class players.
The annual Linares super-grandmaster tournament is now acknowledged as one of the world's most prestigeous chess events. Players feel privileged to be invited, and Kasparov has even said that whoever wins at Linares can consider himself to be the world's tournament chess champion for the year.
The first inkling of trouble surfaced when Kamsky faxed a letter to Rentero last month in which he declared his intention not to play in next year's Linares tournament.
He claimed that the majority of the players at Linares next year were Kasparov's followers and he accused them of not hesitating to give Kasparov "some free points to let him become first."
He suggested that Artur Yusupov and Alexander Beliavsky be replaced by players like Valery Salov, Judit Polgar, Joel Lautier and Jeroen Piket who would fight honestly with Kasparov.
"I cannot shake (Kasparov's) hand and sit with him at one table. I cannot forgive him all the dirt and intrigues in blocking my match with Karpov for the world championship title. I do not even accept him as the champion of the PCA," said Kamsky.
Karpov entered the fray a few days later. Addressing Rentero in another fax message, Karpov reminded the Spanish businessman of Kasparov's behaviour on previous occasions such as signing a contract to play in this year's Linares tournament but then boycotting it later.
Karpov charged that Kasparov used his influence as the PCA president to arrange the Anand-Kamsky PCA Candidates final match to coincide with the Linares event this year, and this prevented them from taking part in the tournament.
And in case Rentero was still willing to forget what Kasparov had done, Karpov reminded him about Kasparov's breach of chess etiquette in 1994 in the latter's game with Judit Polgar.
In that incident, Kasparov had retracted his move after releasing his fingers from a piece. Kasparov claimed his hand was still touching his knight but a video replay showed clearly that his fingers had left the piece for perhaps a quarter of a second. Kasparov refused to apologise even when confronted by this evidence.
Karpov said Kasparov's dirty politics at the 1994 Moscow Olympiad and Congress had led to the current situation between FIDE and the PCA, and until this was resolved, for him to play in the same tournament as Kasparov would be to approve of his actions of the last 18 months.
The tone of these two messages, especially the one from Kamsky, indicate that they have withdrawn from next year's Linares tournament which is a pity since the best way to keep Kasparov in check is to play him at tournaments and make sure he has a hard time in his games.
