CHESS players have started preparations for the 2008 Olympiad scheduled for November in the Germany city of Dresden.

Already, two tournaments have been conducted to select players who will compete at the next Olympiad, Godfrey Kabera the head of technical committee in the local Chess federation has said.

"We had a first qualifiers tournament and we have just ended the second tournament, all in preparation for the forthcoming Olympiad,” Kabera stated.

Also one of the top seed in the country, Kabera said that five players have been selected to represent Rwanda in the world’s popular chess competition.

The selected players include Alex Ruzigura from School of Finance and Banking (SFB) Chess Club, Maxence Murara (Kigali Chess Club), Godfrey Kabera (SFB). Others are Protogene Munyehirwe from the National University of Rwanda (NUR), and Kagabo Mugema from Rugenge Chess Club.

Among the five, Kabera and Murara are the highly placed Rwandan players in the international ranking with 1949 and 1682 points respectively.

This is the third time Rwanda will be represented at the Chess Olympiad competition that is used to evaluate players’ world rankings.

Chess Olympiad also attracts thousands of players including masters and grand masters from all over the world.

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