On June 30th, second day of his visit to Nicaragua, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov met with the President of the National Football Federation Jose Jasinto Reyes, who underlined that respects chess very much and sees great potential cooperation between these two sports. Towards this end, in the premises of the National football stadium, facilities have been provided for chess lessons. Football, alongside baseball, is the most popular sports in Nicaragua. FIDE President and the Football Federation President discussed possible joint projects, to seek additional interest to the chess development.

During his stay in Managua, FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov met with PRONicaragua Agency Head, Mr. Loreano Ortega, son of the Nicaraguan leader. Mr. Ortega junior supervises the construction of a new canal between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, being also the Head of the Russia-Nicaragua intergovernmental commission on trade, economic and scientific-technical cooperation.
Taking into account the importance of Russian chess school, Mr. Loreano Ortega expressed his readiness to increase the interaction in the sphere of chess between Nicaragua and the Russian Federation to a new level of an intergovernmental Commission. The FIDE President has briefed Mr. Ortega about FIDE, its main activities as well as the Chess in Schools project and earlier achieved agreements with the Nicaraguan Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports.


Kirsan Ilyumzhinov and Marlon Torres, Director of the National Sports Institute, at the entrance to a football academy


FIDE President got lots of souvenirs from Jose Jasinto Reyes, President of the National Football Federation


T-shirt of the national football team


The heads of various departments of the National Football Federation


The meeting with Mr. Loreano Ortega was also attended by Mr. Salvador Vergara (centre), Assistant to the President on Education, and Mr. Marlon Torres (left), Director of the National Sports Institute.







Meeting with the legendary Comandante Daniel Ortega who underlined the special status of chess and its importantce for the youth education. The leader welcomed the achieved agreements and called for the immediate start of implementing chess in schools in the Nicaragua rural zone, especially in the under-developed areas, in the shortest time.


Souvenir Kalmyk chess set for Daniel Ortega