20.04.2005 Teimour Radjabov's opinion

What do you think about the situation with Fischer receiving the Icelandic citizenship? Is it good, bad or neutral news for chess?

An excellent and a humane decision of the Icelandic government. It’s a pity, only one country was brave enough to give refuge to Bobby. Ingenious Fischer is imprisoned? – it’s nonsense. There are some negative points in his propositions and emotions, to my mind, but this is HIS OWN opinion, and this is not a proper reason for the imprisonment.

What changes of the present situation with the world championship are the most probable from your point of view?

I don’t know now. I got absolutely entangled with constant changes of rules and methods of the world championship. Maybe it’s better to return to the old system with interzonal tournaments and the Candidate matches? It needs to be improved, made more dynamic and spectacular. However, it’s necessary to think over the ways of doing this.

I have a lot of questions to the FIDE’s proposal. Who determined the eight players? And on which ground? Why, for instance, some finalists and semifinalists of the last championship were invited, while others were not. Why there is no competition for the spots? Who will play if someone declines (“someone” will certainly refuse to play)? An analogy with 1948 is being drawn. It was a different case – the king died. Thanks God, now we have numerous kings who are in good health.

Who of modern young players could in your opinion feel Kasparov's shoes in the future? Who could break to the elite?

Kasparov himself proclaimed Carlsen, Nakamura and Karjakin to be his successors. It’s quite embarrassing for me to announce the list because until recently (till Linares 2003) Kasparov considered me to be promising. Probably I played very poorly against him in Linares – I hung the knight – and my name was driven out of the list of the promising. This is a good lesson for the young players: don’t offer the pieces to Kasparov, and especially, don’t sacrifice them in no circumstances, and then your name will be in the list for a long time.

Questions were asked by Misha Savinov.

This article is published with permission of Association of Chess Professionals