The World Youth Under 16 Chess Olympiad started in Dogubeyazit, Agri, Turkey between 5-13 August 2006. The tournament will be organized under the auspieces of Federation Internationale Des Echecs (FIDE). The main sponsor is Agri Governer and Dogubeyazit Municipality.

FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov arrived on 5 August 2006 on an official visit to Agri to open World Youth Chess Olympiad. In his speech he underlined that he and also chess society are very much impressed about the development of Turkish Chess and thanked everyone who assist in that development but especially the Deputy Prime Minister Mehmet Ali Sahin. He thanked also the Governor and Major of the city of Agri to organise this event.

Kirsan Ilyumzhinov played a match with the Governor of Agri, Ali Nihat YAZICI was assisting him for a friendly draw!

Pictures from the World Youth Chess Olympiad Opening. FIDE President`s visit

A record number of countries have registered for this tournament from different continents. This year`s event has the highest participation in Children`s Olympiad history. 21 countries and 24 teams applied for this chess tournament including Australia, Azerbaijan, China with two teams, Georgia, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Korea, South Africa, Singapore, India, Switzerland, Turkmenistan with two teams, Tunisia, Ukraine, Uzbekstan, Syria, Sweden, Iran, Iraq and Kenya. Also Turkey is participating with three teams.

The participant number is 170 with players, officials, trainers and accompanying persons, another record broken in the history of the championship. More information is available on the Official TCF web site.