Sam,

Pono is the FIDE W-C and that is a fact. He feels he has weight in the
chess world because of it.

He is demanding the $ 150,000 because that is how much he had to pay lawyers
to draw the deal that fell apart, I can understand that.

The bottom line is if he loses the match to Kasparov nobody will consider
him the WC of anything, so it does not matter !


"Sam Sloan" wrote in message
...
Have you read the demands of Ponomariov?

Among other things, he is demanding to be paid $150,000 "damages" by
FIDE because his match in Argentina was cancelled when the sponsors
could not raise the money.

Never in chess history has a player demanded to be paid so much for a
match which was never played.

He also demands that his match with Kasparov be deemed a semi-final
match, not a match for the World Championship. What this means is that
even if he looses the match to Kasparov, he will still be World
Champion.

Who ever heard of such a thing? What sponsor will pay such a large
amount of money if the match is not for the World Chess Championship?

Remember that Ponomariov was also demanding draw odds from Kasparov.

If it were me in charge of FIDE, I would just ignore the crazy demands
of Ponomariov and forget about him.

Ponomariov seems to think that the title of World Chess Champion is
his personal property, not a title awarded by an international
sporting organization.

Sam Sloan