Chess legend to be deported
2004-07-20 07:50
Narita, Japan - The Japanese government is preparing to deport chess legend Bobby Fischer for staying in the country on an invalid passport, immigration officials said on Tuesday.
Fischer was detained at the Narita international airport just outside of Tokyo last Tuesday after trying to board a flight for Manila, Philippines.
Immigration officials confirmed that Fischer, 61, has been held in their custody since, and said he was being processed for deportation. They refused to give further details, but said he could appeal their decision.
They said they did not know how long the deportation process would take. A request by The Associated Press to meet with Fischer was denied by the airport immigration office, which cited "privacy concerns".
Fischer, believed by many to be the greatest chess player ever, has lived in seclusion and semi-secrecy for decades. It remains unclear where he considers home, but after he was taken into custody, friends here said he frequently travelled, staying for short durations in Japan, the Philippines, Germany and other countries.
He was believed to have been in Japan since about April.
Miyoko Watai, a member of the Japan Chess Association and a friend of Fischer's, said he did not know that his passport had been revoked when he tried to leave Japan last week. She indicated that Fischer intended to appeal any effort to deport him, and planned to hire a lawyer.
Fischer became the US chess champion at age 14, and a grandmaster at 15. He became an icon in the United States when he defeated Soviet world champion Boris Spassky in a series of games in Reykjavik, Iceland. The games, in 1972, came at the height of the Cold War and were hailed in the United States as a major victory.
His hero status quickly faded amid his increasingly eccentric behaviour, however. He lost his title as world champion in 1978 and then largely vanished from the public eye.
Fischer is wanted in the United States for playing a rematch against Spassky in Yugoslavia in 1992. Yugoslavia was under international sanctions at the time, and US citizens were banned from doing business there.
Fischer won the match, and more than $3m in prize money.
- AP