17 January, Vitebsk /Olga Bogacheva - BELTA/. An international chess tournament will be held from 23-29 January in Orsha, Nikolay Zarubitsky, Chairman of the Orsha City Chess Federation, informed a BELTA correspondent. The event, organised in Orsha for the tenth time, will bring together 350 participants aged from 6 to 70 years from Belarus, Russia, Ukraine, Armenia, Moldova, Latvia, and Estonia. Chess players will demonstrate their skills in age categories (under 10 years, under 12, under 14, under 16, over 16 years), and will also take part in a rating tournament, where, depending on their performance, they can improve their positions in the overall rating. In addition, a tournament will be held specifically for professionals, featuring only international masters. It is expected that around 20 chess players will compete for victory in this event. In addition to intellectual competitions, an interesting excursion programme to the memorable places of Orsha has been prepared for the tournament participants. The Orsha City Executive Committee and the Belarusian Chess Federation are the organisers of the event. -0-

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