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FIDE suspends GM Christopher Yoo following new harassment allegation

May 12, 202525,431 viewsEnglish (US)

Chess Personalities Over the board Tournament Chess

The FIDE Ethics and Disciplinary Commission (EDC) has suspended GM Christopher Yoo for 60 days following the submission of a second complaint alleging harassment, which is currently under preliminary review by the commission.

All opinions expressed are my own, and not necessarily those of Lichess

Background

On November 14, 2024, the US Chess Federation imposed a one-year ban prohibiting GM Christopher Yoo from participating in tournaments under the auspices of USCF. This sanction also included a five-year probationary period extending through November 14, 2030.

This followed an incident at the St Louis Chess Club during the 2024 US Chess Championship where, after losing his Round 5 game against GM Fabiano Caruana, GM Christopher Yoo destroyed his scoresheet, stormed out of the playing hall, and allegedly punched a female videographer in the back from behind. Yoo was expelled from the championship, and banned from STLCC as a result. The police were called and they arrested Yoo and he was charged with 4th degree assault.

Recent Incident

The alleged recent incident involved a female player at the Sardinia World Chess Festival (April 26-May 4 2025). According to an article in the Hindustan Times:

“It started after the Grenke Open (held in April), at a party where there were several players, including Christopher,” the female player told HT. “We met there. He asked us for some group pictures. We accepted. During the party, I found his behaviour uncomfortable. The day after, he messaged me, so I blocked him on social media. At the Sardinia World Chess Festival (April 26-May 4), while I was having lunch with friends at the hotel restaurant, he approached us out of nowhere, spoke to us uninvited, and suddenly caught my hand while I was eating.”

“On Saturday, May 3, after lunch, he followed my friends and me to our room area. I went into my room and shut the door. He stayed outside, knocking several times and even said ‘housekeeping’ through the door. He stayed there for 10 minutes before leaving. He also touched my shoulder on another occasion. None of this was welcome or appropriate. My friends repeatedly asked him to leave us alone, but he didn’t stop.”
The complainant also said that Yoo berated her, remarking that he doesn’t respect players who are lower rated: “Your brain doesn’t know how to move the knight.”

It is not the first time that sexual harassment and derogarory sexist comments towards female players have gone hand in hand.
Sadly, this also wasn’t the first occasion that the complainant had experienced harassment in a chess-related context. According to the HT article, she said:

“I was 11 when I was harassed for the first time. It was my chess trainer. I didn’t realise what was happening or its gravity until I was a young teen or adult.”

According to an IM who witnessed the alleged events, they said:

“I was there and I saw how uncomfortable Christopher made her feel, and the sort of pressure he was putting on her – like touching her and following her to her room. At one point, he joined us at the bar where some of us (including the complainant) were having a drink. We asked him to leave because we were not comfortable with his behaviour towards her, but he just refused.”

FIDE

According to FIDE , Yoo’s suspension “stems from two separate complaints alleging violations of the Fide Ethics and Disciplinary Code: Case 5/2025 (A), filed by the United States Chess Federation (USCF), and an additional recent complaint, which is under investigation by the EDC.”

FIDE also stated in the article:

Under Article 26.12 of the FIDE Charter, national sanctions may be extended internationally if a member federation requests it and if the decision complies with fundamental legal principles and fair trial standards. In line with this, the USCF formally submitted a request for FIDE to recognize and globally enforce its ban, pursuant to Article 4.15 of the FIDE Ethics Code. This request remains under investigation.
Given the gravity of the allegations and the ongoing proceedings, the Chair of the EDC has enacted a temporary suspension of GM Yoo to safeguard the integrity of the investigative process. Both GM Yoo and the USCF have been formally notified of this decision. The suspension may be extended if a final resolution is not reached within the initial 60-day period.

It is shocking but sadly not unexpected to hear about yet another case of alleged harassment of a female player by a male player at chess tournaments.

National vs International Ban

One major point of debate is how a player who had allegedly assaulted someone at a chess tournament last year, and who was banned from competing in US Chess-organised events was still allowed to compete internationally. This is because his ban from national events does not extend to FIDE-rated events unless the FIDE EDC rules this. The current temporary 60-day playing suspension seems to be an emergency measure to allow time to deal with the latest allegations while safeguarding player safety at events, and according to the ECD “safeguard the integrity of the investigative process.”

An article published on chess.com on May 6th stated that Chris Bird had indeed filed a complaint to the FIDE EDC on 10th December 2024. US Chess then contacted him on 21st December and asked if he would withdraw his complaint if they requested that the ban be globally extended to include international events, and he agreed to this request.

However, it seems that the FIDE EDC only received the case from US Chess on 30th April this year, around four months later. And because no interim measures had been requested, Yoo was free to play in tournaments abroad.

Apparently, according to a statement by his parents, Yoo’s doctors and other medical professionals felt that he was not a safety risk to other players, and had even encouraged him to return to tournament play, a decision which with the benefit of hindsight, they appear to have got disastrously wrong.

Statement by Christopher Yoo's father

A statement by Yoo’s father, Young-Kyu Yoo published in the chesscom article on May 6th raises some interesting points with hindsight:

We know there are some who are understandably critical of Christopher playing in-person rated international chess right now given he is still in the midst of a 12-month ban in the US for striking a video videographer after a loss at the US Championship. But there have been some misconceptions surrounding the sanction and his return to competitive play so we wanted to try to clear them up.

I can entirely see why people would be critical of this, as though somehow there won’t be a risk of another incident in international competitions, only domestic tournaments.

Christopher remains deeply sorry and regretful for what he did at the US Championship in October. He carries this with him always.

Whilst apologies are always welcome, coming from his parents, it feels second-hand, and also I feel that the chess world is waiting and watching to see what actions follow these words. If someone is truly sorry, you would not expect to see any further incidents.

The decision for Christopher to return to in-person tournament play was not one Christopher made on his own. It involved his parents (us) and his doctors. Christopher resumed play after undergoing extensive evaluation and treatment by multiple professionals, who agreed he was not an ongoing safe play risk and that, at this point, resuming tournament chess would be good for his mental wellbeing. He was actually encouraged by his doctors to resume tournament play. Please also bear in mind he had never done anything like this before, in or outside of chess, and he hasn't done anything like this since.

Whilst this is good, and I am sure made with the very best of intentions and expertise, it unfortunately turned out to be a poor decision. This must be very difficult for his parents, since it appears they tried to get him the help he obviously needed with various medical professionals.

He was not banned from FIDE events or non-US Chess events. That was made clear to us from the outset when US Chess imposed their sanction. Moreover, he will continue to respect his ban from US Chess and forgo USCF-rated events and any events where he would have to participate as a representative of US Chess, like the World Cup, Grand Swiss, etc. He is not seeking any special exemptions or exceptions.

This is all good, but in my opinion was not enough on its own.

FIDE may or may not at some point impose their own sanction. We recently heard there is a FIDE investigation that has commenced and we will cooperate fully.

Some have expressed the opinion a ban from playing in one country is not sufficient. We want to say a US ban in and of itself is a very serious restriction for an American player like Christopher. Unlike many strong and/or promising young GMs who have financial support from their federations or sponsors, most young American GMs like Christopher do not, and travel is probably the single biggest expense for Christopher. We live on the West Coast, so trips to Europe and the Middle East are particularly long and costly. That meant that for the last few years, the great majority of his tournaments have been in the US.

I tend to agree that a ban from one country's tournaments is not enough, as events have shown us.

Finally we want to re-iterate that he would never have resumed play if his doctors felt he was of danger to anyone. He resumed play when he did with the encouragement of his doctors, who felt a return to competitive chess would be a positive step for his mental wellbeing.Yes, we know chess is hard and often stressful. Chess is even, as Christopher said in jest on stage at the closing ceremony in Sardinia, “cold,” meaning, he told us, unforgiving of mistakes. And, yes, he made a horrible mistake in October that many may find difficult to forgive. But to Christopher, chess remains the dream, and to us, his parents, and to others, like his doctors, who genuinely care about Christopher, chess is his road back from where he was on a very dark day in St. Louis in October.

All of this is even more unfortunate now given the recent revelations, the critics he mentions in the opening paragraph were right to be concerned.
It does beg questions firstly, as to why it appeared to take over 3 months for US Chess to make the request to the EDC having apparently agreed this on 21 December 2024 (according to IA Chris Bird), and also whether the FIDE EDC should have acted faster when they received the request from US Chess in March 2025 for a global extension of the November 2024 ban under Article 4.15 of FIDE’s Ethics Code.

International Arbiter Chris Bird was quoted in the chess.com article as saying:

My issue is that the system appears to be clearly broken, that someone who did something significantly wrong in terms of a safe play issue gets a sanction but that sanction doesn't apply to everywhere.

Clearly this is something that it would be good to address, and soon. I hope that in cases where players are found guilty, that the sanctions are swift and severe enough to act as a deterrent to others, and that this culture will improve and female players can at last both feel and actually be safe at tournaments. It makes no sense to allow this sort of situation to occur, in my opinion.

We still have a long way to go in this regard, in terms of player safety and avoidable incidents, particularly in this case where there was a known risk, but it did not appear to be fully addressed for months. The main issue here I think is the system, and how it does, indeed, seem to be broken.

The chess world needs to do better than this.