Levon Aronian to compete with Vladimir Kramnik in 12th round

YEREVAN, MARCH 29, ARMENPRESS. Armenia’s strongest chess player Levon Aronian will compete with Vladimir Kramnik in the 12th round of the Candidates Tournament, which is being held in London.

As reports "Armenpress" after the 11th round Levon Aronian occupies the third position with 6,5 points. Magnus Carlsen solely tops the ranking list of the tournament. The leader has scored 7,5 points. Russia's Vladimir Kramnik climbed up to the second position. The Russian Grand Master has 7 points in his active.

Peter Svidler occupies the fourth place with 5,5 points. Boris Gelfand and Alexander Grischuk occupy the fifth and sixth positions respectively. Ukraine's Vassily Ivanchuk has 4 points in his active. And Azerbaijan's Teimour Radjabov has only 3,5 points.

The FIDE Candidates Tournament launches in London. The world’s eight strongest chess players will compete with each other from March 15 to April 1. This is the final contest to determine the challenger for the World Chess Championship. The winner of the Candidates Tournament will earn the right to a match for the World Championship against the incumbent World Champion Viswanathan Anand.

Levon Aronian - Levon was born on 6 October, 1982. On the May 2012 FIDE list he had an Elo rating of 2908, making him number three in the world. Aronian won the Chess World Cup 2005. He led the Armenian national team to the Gold medals in the 2006 (Turin), 2008 (Dresden) and 2012 (Istanbul) Chess Olympics and at the World Team Chess Championship in Ningbo 2011. He won the FIDE Grand Prix 2008–2010, qualifying him for the Candidates tournament for the World Chess Championship 2012. He was also World Chess960 Champion in 2006 and 2007, World Rapid Chess Champion in 2009, and World Blitz Chess Champion in 2010. Aronian was declared the best sportsman of Armenia in 2005 and was awarded the title of "Honoured Master of Sport of the Republic of Armenia" in 2009.

Vladimir Kramnik - Vladimir Kramnik was born on 25 June, 1975 Kramnik is a Russian chess grandmaster. He was the Classical World Chess Champion from 2000 to 2006, and the undisputed World Chess Champion from 2006 to 2007. He has also won the two strongest chess tournaments (by rating strength) in history: the 2009 Mikhail Tal Memorial and the 2010 Grand Slam Masters Final. He has won three team gold medals and three individual medals at Chess Olympiads. In October 2000, he defeated Garry Kasparov in a match played in London, and became the Classical World Chess Champion. In late 2004, Kramnik successfully defended his title against challenger Péter Lékó in a drawn match played in Brissago, Switzerland. In October 2006, Kramnik, the Classical World Champion, defeated reigning FIDE World Champion Veselin Topalov in a unification match, the World Chess Championship 2006. As a result Kramnik became the first undisputed World Champion, holding both the FIDE and Classical titles, since Kasparov split from FIDE in 1993. In 2007, Kramnik lost the title to Viswanathan Anand, who won the World Chess Championship tournament ahead of Kramnik. Kramnik qualified for the Candidates Tournament which determined the challenger to face World Champion Anand in the World Chess Championship 2012.