World chess champion Magnus Carlsen, competing in August 2022, says cheating is ‘an existential threat’ to the game – Copyright AFP/File Arun SANKAR
Chess superstar Magnus Carlsen first openly accused American Hans Niemann of cheating on Monday, saying the rising star had done it more recently and more often than he previously admitted.
The chess world has been rocked for three weeks by the Carlsen-Niemann controversy, as the 31-year-old five-time world champion withdrew from the US Sinquefield Cup after losing to 19-year-old Niemann.
Last week, the Norwegian’s abrupt withdrawal from a match against Niemann in the Julius Baer Generation Cup online tournament reignited the furore.
In a letter posted on Twitter and addressed to “Dear Chess World”, Carlsen said: “I think Niemann has cheated more, and more recently, than he has publicly admitted.
“His progress on the board has been unusual.”
He did not specify the exact form of the alleged trap, but added that there was “more that I would like to say”.
Niemann has acknowledged cheating online twice, when he was 12 and 16, but says he has never fraudulently played in a head-to-head match and is even willing to play naked to prove his good faith.
In early September, the American chess platform chess.com banned the American for cheating on the site.
AFP reached out to Niemann for comment, but he did not immediately respond.
During his Sinquefield Cup match, Niemann did not appear to be tense or even “fully focused on the game in critical positions, while outplaying me as Black in a way that I think only a few players can,” Carlsen continued in his letter.
He called cheating in chess “an existential threat to the game” and said, “I don’t want to play against people who have repeatedly cheated in the past.”
He concluded by saying that he hoped the truth would come out, “whatever it is.”