Then in the FIDE World Championship Tournaments, firstly at Groningen 1997, he reached the quarter finals where he lost to Boris Gelfand. In the next four FIDE World Championship tournaments he was knocked out at the last sixteen stage: at Las Vegas 1999 by Michael Adams, at New Delhi 2000 to Veselin Topalov, at Moscow 2001 to Viswanathan Anand, and finally at Tripoli 2004 to Leinier Dominguez.