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 The German City of Dortmund will host the BGN Candidates tournament for the BGN World Championship under the aegis of the Dortmunder Sparkassen Chess Meetings. Under an agreement signed between Braingames Network and Dortmund City the BGN Candidates will be the 30th Sparkassen Chess Meeting with run from 6th to 21st July 2002. The victor of this competition will face BGN Champion Vladimir Kramnik of Russia in a 16 game title play-off later that year at Bahrain. Six top players will be invited to Dortmund including ex world champion Gary Kasparov of Russia and FIDE World Champion Viswanathan Anand of India.
Two places remain open for a world wide BGN internet competition starting August
2001 for which anyone in the world is eligible to take part. From August 2001 onwards several internet qualifying tournaments will beheld on the BGN website
http://www.braingames.net and the exact field of competitors for Dortmund should be known by March 2002. BGN Champion Vladimir Kramnik who defeated Kasparov by two wins to 13 draws for the title in London last year said today at the press conference Holiday Inn Hotel, Dortmund "There is actually no reason
for Kasparov to avoid this Candidates tournament. The conditions are good and I hope and believe that he will be there."
Raymond Keene BGN Games Director said that Dortmund was the ideal host for such an event on account of its long tradition and service to the cause of classical chess." Dortmund has proposed the most appropriate and convincing framework for the BGN World Championship cycle. Other cities which have expressed interest in the BGN qualifying cycle are London, Buenos Aires, Bahrain and Leon in
Spain. Gerd Kolbe the Organisational Director of the Dortmunder Sparkassen Chess Meetings
added, "We are delighted that for the 30th anniversary of the Dortmund Chess Meetings that we will be hosting such a prestigious event." The organisational details are already underway and the head of the Organising Committee will be the Lord Mayor of Dortmund Dr Gerhard Langemeyer. The likely candidates for the venue in Dortmund are the
Opera House and the Westfalenhalle.
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