Russia moves to Asia

 The big decision out of the Asian Chess Summit was the acceptance of the Russian Chess Federation as a member of the Asian Chess Federation. The CFR gave a presentation about how Russia wanted to join with the growing chess powerhouse that is Asia, but the obvious question of "Why now, exactly?" was strangely ignored. There were a few legal questions raised, as this was the first time a Federation had changed continents. The main issue was, could the CFR join the ACF without leaving the ECU, or would joining the ACF fulfill the condition of leaving the ECU. Much to late it occurred to me that the simplest solution to all this was for the CFR to resign from FIDE itself, and then apply to rejoin FIDE as part of the Asian Chess Federation at the next General Assembly.

As for the vote it was 29 yes, 6 abstentions, and 1 no. I attended as the voting delegate for the Papua New Guinea Chess Federation, and PNG was the single no vote.