Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, a former governor of Russia’s Republic of Kalmykia and a long-time head of the international chess governing body FIDE, has once again brought global attention to his extraordinary claim that he was abducted by aliens in the late 1990s. The decades-old assertion has resurfaced after a recent podcast appearance, where he reiterated that extraterrestrial beings dressed in yellow suits took him aboard a spaceship, communicated with him telepathically, and even told him that the game of chess was originally created by them.
Many may no longer recall Ilyumzhinov, who once ruled Kalmykia—then Europe’s only Buddhist-majority republic and now a Russian federal subject—and later became one of the most influential figures in international chess administration. However, a recent interview in which he once again described his alleged alien encounter has gone viral on social media, reviving curiosity and disbelief around his story. In the interview, Ilyumzhinov claimed that in 1997 he was abducted by extraterrestrials wearing yellow spacesuits and informed that chess was not a human invention but an alien one.
Although the claim is not new, it has gained renewed attention following Ilyumzhinov’s conversation with Jesse Michaels on the American Alchemy Podcast. Short clips from the interview have circulated widely on X, prompting fresh reactions from audiences around the world. During the discussion, Ilyumzhinov said that he was taken directly from the balcony of his Moscow apartment by alien beings, who transported him to their spacecraft and communicated with him without using spoken language.
This was not the first time Ilyumzhinov made such assertions. He initially revealed the story publicly in 2010 during an interview on the Russian television programme Pozner, hosted by journalist Vladimir Pozner on Channel One. Since then, he has repeated the account in numerous interviews across both Russian and Western media, consistently standing by his version of events without any retraction.
Kirsan Nikolayevich Ilyumzhinov is a Russian businessman and politician whose public identity rests on three defining aspects: his lengthy and often controversial leadership of Kalmykia, his tenure as president of the World Chess Federation (FIDE), and his persistent claim of having experienced an alien abduction. Born in 1962 in Elista, the capital of Kalmykia, he developed an early passion for chess, winning the Kalmykian national championship at the age of just 14.
Before entering politics and amassing wealth, Ilyumzhinov followed a conventional Soviet-era path. He worked as a factory mechanic, completed two years of compulsory service in the Soviet Army, and later studied at Moscow’s prestigious MGIMO institute, known for training future diplomats and political elites. His fortunes rose rapidly during the collapse of the Soviet Union, when he became president of the SAN Corporation between 1990 and 1993, benefiting from the emergence of private enterprise during that turbulent period.
In 1993, at only 31 years old, Ilyumzhinov won the presidential election in Kalmykia, making him one of the youngest regional leaders in Russia. He remained in power for 17 years, ruling with a strong hand while pursuing ambitious projects, sometimes even paying government salaries from his personal funds. One of his most unusual policies was making chess compulsory in schools, transforming Elista into an unlikely global centre for the game.
His passion for chess extended beyond Kalmykia. In 1995, he became president of FIDE, a position he held until 2018. While his leadership helped expand chess into new regions, his tenure was also marred by controversy, particularly after he was sanctioned by the United States following a 2012 visit to Syria, during which he played chess with President Bashar al-Assad.
Ilyumzhinov’s account of his alleged extraterrestrial encounter remains one of the most unusual episodes associated with his public life. He has claimed that the humanoid beings who abducted him placed him in a spacesuit, showed him around their craft, and explained that their intention was simply to demonstrate that UFOs exist. According to him, communication occurred telepathically, involving an exchange of thoughts rather than spoken words.
In his most recent interview, Ilyumzhinov elaborated further, saying the aliens presented themselves as peaceful observers rather than interveners. He claimed they told him that Earth had hosted several civilisations before humanity, that aliens were responsible for creating human life, that human civilisation remains in an early developmental stage, and that chess originated beyond Earth. He insisted there was no discussion of politics, military matters, technology, or state secrets, and described the encounter as calm and informational.
When Ilyumzhinov first made these claims public in 2010, the reaction in Russia ranged from ridicule to disbelief. Media outlets treated the story as an odd curiosity, while comedians and tabloids turned it into satire. However, not everyone dismissed it lightly. Andrei Lebedev, a member of the Russian parliament at the time, formally wrote to then-President Dmitry Medvedev, requesting that Ilyumzhinov be interrogated by the state. Lebedev reportedly feared that sensitive information about Russia might have been shared with extraterrestrials.
Despite widespread scepticism, Ilyumzhinov has never backed away from his claims, repeating them consistently over the years. His recent appearance on the American Alchemy Podcast has once again brought his story into the spotlight, with social media amplifying interest in a claim that remains as unbelievable as it is enduring. While there have been many accounts of alien abductions over the years, few involve a figure as prominent as a former regional leader and international sports official, making Ilyumzhinov’s story uniquely strange and persistently fascinating.
