Newsgroups: rec.games.chess
Date: Sat, 25 Jul 1992 17:33:27 -0400 
From: Louis Blair <lb2e+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: Fischer rumor

From page 3 of the Saturday, July 25, 1992 issue of
The New York Times:

Fischer and Spassky Said to Sign for Chess Rematch in Yugoslavia
by Chuck Sudetic

     Belgrade, Yugoslavia, July 24 - Bobby Fischer, the onetime enfant ter-
rible of world chess who became the first American to win the world cham-
pionship, only to resign it undefended, will play a $5 million exhibition match
here against Boris Spassky, the Russian he defeated for the title 20 years
ago in Reykjavik, Iceland, a Yugoslav promoter said today.

     The match would end nearly two decades of seclusion for Mr. Fisher
since he played Mr. Spassky in perhaps the most publicized and widely fol-
lowed chess match in the history of the game.  the match would also likely be
viewed as a violation of the international sanctions against Yugoslavia im-
posed by the United Nations in an effort to halt the fighting in Bosnia and
Herzegovina.

     The promoter of the match, Jezdimir Vasiljevic, owner of a Belgrade-based
bank, said at a news conference that Mr. Fischer arrived in the Yugoslav
capital today and will announce in a videotaped statement Saturday that he
has signed a contract to play Mr. Spassky.

     The match is scheduled to begin Sept. 2 on the island of Sveti Stefan, a
once down-at-heels fishing village converted into an exclusive hotel by Presi-
dent Tito, Yugoslavia's longtime Communist ruler.  The competition will end
with a series of games played in Belgrade, said Mr. Vasiljevic, who now
runs the hotel.

Match Confirmed by Spassky

     |Mr. Spassky, speaking from a vacation home in Allemont, France, in
a telephone interview with Robert Byrne, a grandmaster and the chess
columnist of The New York Times, confirmed that Mr. Fischer had
agreed to the match.

     |"Yes, Bobby Fischer and I have signed a contract to contest a `world
championship' match.  I've received an advance, but Bobby wants the
amount kept secret," Mr. Spassky said with enthusiasm.  "He pulls me
out of oblivion.  He makes me fight.  It's a miracle and I am grateful."]

     The contract calls for the two grandmasters to play until one gains up 10
victories, Mr. Vasiljevic said.  Under the contract, the winner would receive
$3.35 million and the loser $1.65 million.  The match would be declared
a draw if
each player won nine games, and the two contestants would share the prize
money equally.

     Mr. Fischer, now 49 years old, won the world championship in 1972, defeat-
ing Mr. Spassky, now 55, in one of the most celebrated chess matches of all
time.  The brash, eccentric Mr. Fischer retired from chess two years later,
becoming the only champion in history to forfeit his title without suffering
defeat.  Over the years, the reclusive former champion has rejected numer-
ous offers, some running into millions of dollars, to return to
competition, but
he never explained why.

Violation of Sanctions

     Western diplomats said Mr. Fischer's contract to play the match would
likely be considered a violation of United Nations economic sanctions im-
posed against Yugoslavia.

     The United States Government has adhered to the sanctions' provisions so
strictly that even Yugoslavs with the right to United States Social Security
payments have had their checks cut off.  Mr. Fischer is a United States
citizen; Mr. Spassky holds French citizenship and lives outside Paris.

     "I cannot return the money, and that isn't my goal," said Mr. Vasiljevic.
"What I have done for Serbia and Montenegro is incomparably greater than
just chess or just the match alone.  By bringing Fischer to Yugoslavia we
have broken the blockade in a most spectacular manner.  The world hit us
with all its force, and I think that in this way we have returned at least one
punch."

     Serbia and Monteregro are the only two republics of the old Yugoslavia
that make up the new Yugoslavia state.

     "We practically had to abduct Fischer from the airport in Budapest be-
cause we were afraid that they might take his passport and bar him from
entering Yugoslavia," Mr. Vasiljevic said.

     "Bobby still considers himself the world champion because no one ever
beat him," said Mr. Vasiljevic.  Then, referring to the current world cham-
pion, Gary Kasparov, and the longtime challenger, Anatoly Karpov, he added:
"He told us that he studied the matches between Kasparov and Karpov for an
entire year and a half.  He says he will prove the matches between the two
men, who are officially the world's two best chess players, were fixed."