In a brave public act, David Navara explains in details what he went through after the baseless allegations of Kramnik. Navara describes the emotional torture by Kramnik’s allegations, the silence of FIDE, their posterior inadequate reaction and total disregard on basic FIDE ethical and moral values. Navara ends his letter with a demand of resignation of Arkady Dvorkovich as FIDE President and provoked a massive reaction by the chess world
Timeline of events
23.05.2025 Navara publishes an open letter about Kramnik’s actions
23.05.2025 Reactions to Navara’s open letter – Aronian, Polgar, etc
23.05.2025 Navara and Kramnik to meet at FIDE World Rapid and Blitz
24.05.2025 David Navara, “I firmly believe that Mr Dvorkovich should resign”
24.05.2025 Kramnik, “I am deeply disappointed Navara participates in unjust PR campaign against me”
24.05.2025 Kramnik rage-blocks Chessdom over a comment on David Navara’s case
24.05.2025 Live: David Navara at French Top 16
25.05.2025 Kramnik admits to allegations, FIDE has grounds to act
25.05.2025 Open call to action for FIDE
26.05.2025 David Navara now has personal chess calendar
26.05.2025 Czech Chess Federation: We stand behind chess legend GM David Navara
28.05.2025 MrDodgy : “Kramnik bullies Navara, will he be satisfied if he ends in hospital or worse?”
29.05.2025 Emil Sutovsky : “I find Kramnik’s latest address to David Navara inhuman”
12.06.2025 David Navara: “When I heard Kramnik’s reaction, I slept really poorly”
26.06.2025 Official Statement of Hetman GKS Katowice Chess Club + Keti Tsatsalashvili of support of David Navara
28.06.2025 Levon Aronian addresses Kramnik’s lawsuit threats towards David Navara
29.06.2025 FIDE addresses the Kramnik vs Navara case
29.06.2025 The entire Nový Bor Chess Club stands firmly behind David Navara
29.06.2025 Prague International Chess Festival thanks cFIDE for taking a clear stance on Kramnik vs Navara
04.07.2025 David Navara in an interview with Greg Mustreader
08.07.2025 Average centipawn loss vs Avereage Relative Centipawn loss in Kramnik vs Navara
In his open letter, published on a blog on Chess.com, David Navara finished with the words, “I am very busy playing three tournaments in a row until June 16, so please do not write to me now unless at least one of the following options holds: a) We are very good friends. b) It is very important. c) It is urgent. d) You are a FIDE official who wants to apologize.”
One of the tournaments David Navara plays is the FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Team 2025, part of the Top events of The Chess Calendar. There, David Navara is going to be in the same playing hall as Vladimir Kramnik.
Kramnik plays for Hexamind Chess Team: Levon Aronian, Leinier Dominguez Perez, Vladimir Kramnik, Peter Svidler, Divya Deshmukh, Vidit Santosh Gujrathi, David Muradyan. Kramnik’s teammate Levon Aronian already reacted to the open letter of David Navara, saying,”I of course , like David , immediately wrote to few people in FIDE asking to investigate , and more or less experienced the same reaction like David, with only difference being that after I understood that there will not be anything done to punish a lying person, I didn’t care to make it public then, hoping that FIDE would learn from that story.”
David Navara plays for Hetman GKS Katowice: David Navara, Dinara Saduakassova, Jan Klimkowski, Jakub Seemann, Jacek Gdanski, Wojciech Smolinski, Keti Tsatsalashvili, Grzegorz Masternak, Patryk Cieslak
Update 26.05.2025 Vladimir Kramnik has withdrawn from the World Team Rapid and Blitz, saying, “I have to withdraw from the World Team Championship, as I have to dedicate significant time to working with my legal team”
