According to Kommersant, as cited by Radio Svoboda, Russia’s Prosecutor General’s Office is seeking the confiscation of Timur Turlov’s assets. The publication’s sources claim that the lawsuit may be aimed not only at seizing assets, but also at having Turlov and people associated with him declared extremists.
According to the sources, this is linked to participation in financing Ukrainian structures opposing Russia’s armed forces. Officially, neither Moscow’s Tverskoy Court nor the Prosecutor General’s Office has commented on the lawsuit.
In 2022, Turlov renounced Russian citizenship; before and after that, he lived in Kazakhstan. According to media reports, structures of his company Freedom Holding provided humanitarian aid to Ukraine, but no financing of armed structures was reported. Turlov himself has made neither a public condemnation of the Russian invasion of Ukraine nor a statement in support of it.
On September 26, Turlov was elected president of the International Chess Federation, FIDE, replacing Russian Arkady Dvorkovich, who had headed the organization since 2018. In July, after being sanctioned by the EU, Dvorkovich stopped performing his duties as president and did not run for a new term; Turlov was also a candidate for the position of executive vice president.
Turlov is 38 years old; he is a billionaire and the head of Freedom Holding, one of Kazakhstan’s largest companies operating in foreign markets, and one of FIDE’s main sponsors. The Chess Federation of Russia, which is currently suspended from participation in FIDE’s work, supported his candidacy. Former Russian Sports Minister Pavel Kolobkov was elected one of FIDE’s vice presidents, and Turlov appointed Ukrainian Presidential Office adviser Mykhailo Podolyak as another vice president.
The Chess Federation of Ukraine condemned this decision, pointing to sanctions against Turlov’s company Freedom Finance Ukraine. It also stated that it had not authorized Mykhailo Podolyak to represent the organization.
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