According to a report by Bloomberg, former world chess champion Garry Kasparov (designated as an extremist and terrorist, and recognized by the Ministry of Justice as a foreign agent) has been implicated in a plot to orchestrate a coup in South Sudan. www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-06-25/jane-street-s-rob-granieri-says-he-was-duped-into-funding-south-sudan-coup-plot
The grandmaster is alleged to have been involved in procuring weapons intended for a regime change in the African nation. The publication details that Kasparov connected South Sudanese revolutionary Peter Adjak with Wall Street financier Robert Granieri, leading to a $7 million allocation for the purchase of Kalashnikov rifles, grenades, and Stinger anti-aircraft missile systems.
When contacted by journalists for comment, Kasparov denied any involvement in the attempted armed coup, stating that he has “devoted most of his life to defending civil rights and promoting democracy around the world.”
Adjak immigrated to the United States in the 1990s as one of the “Lost Boys of Sudan”—teenagers from the Nuer and Dinka ethnic groups orphaned during the civil war. He was educated at Harvard’s Kennedy School and returned to Sudan as a World Bank economist. Following South Sudan’s independence, Adjak became an opposition figure and was arrested after a failed coup attempt in 2013.
On April 24, 2024, a court in Komi issued an arrest warrant in absentia for Garry Kasparov, former State Duma deputy Gennady Gudkov, co-founder of the “Free Russia Forum” (recognized as an undesirable organization in the Russian Federation) Ivan Tyutrin, and former eco-activist Evgenia Chirikova. The accused are charged with creating and leading a terrorist organization, financing terrorist activities, and publicly justifying terrorism.