David R. Sands

China wearies of oddball architecture

Chinese officials are done with being the world's Petri dish for growing avant-garde, weird-looking buildings.

March 3, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: Magnus Carlsen, world chess champion, to defend his title in New York City match

The chess world championship will be coming back to the United States for the first time in more than two decades. Officials of the international chess federation FIDE announced Tuesday that Norwegian world champion Magnus Carlsen will defend his title in a 12-game match to be played in New York City from Nov. 11 to Nov. 30.

March 2, 2016

Global tensions send Russian vodka exports plummeting 40 percent

Clashes with the West over Ukraine and Syria are hitting home for the Russian economy, as foreign markets for its signature spirit, vodka, fell sharply in 2015.

February 23, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: The uneasy chess coupling of correspondence and computers

For one who has played and enjoyed correspondence chess dating back to the pre-Deep Blue era, writing about the latest chess-by-mail world championship is a melancholy business.

February 23, 2016

Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus wins EU concessions despite ‘dismal’ human rights record

European Union foreign ministers this week quietly ended a range of sanctions targeting the regime of longtime Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko and some of the former Soviet republic's largest state-owned firms, despite protests from human rights groups both in Belarus and the West.

February 17, 2016

Obama stars as poster child for Russian anti-smoking ads

An image of President Obama enjoying a last long drag on a cigarette is being used in a new campaign in Moscow to encourage Russians to give up smoking. The message: Both tobacco and the American president can kill you.

February 16, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: A chess wrap-up of action from A(nand) to Z(hao)

With some of the world's top male and female players in action this week, we have the chess world covered this week from A (Anand-Aronian) to Z (Zhao-Zhukova).

February 16, 2016

Antonin Scalia, Supreme Court justice: ‘His contributions to the law are incalculable’

Tom Goldstein, editor of the popular Scotusblog website that tracks the Supreme Court, called Justice Antonin Scalia a "historic figure, surely one of the most influential minds -- on and off the court -- of the last century."

February 13, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: A Valentine’s Day over-the-board mating match — times three — for chess lovers

It doesn't help to know the doorman at Club 5000, the exclusive venue where love and chess meet.

February 9, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: After a long siege, the Berlin Wall starts to come down

Norwegian world champ Magnus Carlsen captured his fifth Tata Steel Masters title, winning the year's first strong event at the Dutch seaside town of Wijk aan Zee with an undefeated 9-4 score, a full point clear of American GM Fabiano Caruana and China's Ding Liren.

February 2, 2016

Iran hard-liners reject middle path, disqualify moderate candidates

For the second time in less than a week, Iran's theocratic leaders have disqualified a slew of moderate candidates from the race for a key governing body, ruling that even the grandson of Iranian revolutionary hero Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini was too ideologically suspect to run for office.

January 26, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: Magnus Carlsen takes risks to rise to chess top at Wijk

The champ isn't resting on his laurels. Unlike some of his illustrious predecessors, world titleholder Magnus Carlsen isn't afraid to mix it up with his rivals, maintaining an active tournament schedule -- and risking the occasional embarrassing loss -- since he first won the crown in November 2013.

January 26, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: Promising Russian chess star Ivan Bukavshin dies of stroke at 20

A.E. Housman's sad lines accompany the sad news out of Russia that talented young GM Ivan Bukavshin has died suddenly of a stroke, still four months shy of his 21st victory.

January 19, 2016

Iran welcomes business rush as sanctions are lifted

Literally hours after the ink had dried on the accord lifting international economic sanctions on Iran, big-name companies across Europe and Asia were signing deals, major world leaders were booking trade missions to Tehran, idled oil fields were being ordered back online, and Iran's financial authorities had processed applications for some 1,000 letters of credit from businesses hoping to cut deals in the near future.

January 18, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: Lasting legacy of Paul Keres, the ‘crown prince of chess’

One hundred years after his birth, he still ranks near the top of any list of the greatest players never to have won the world championship.

January 13, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: His alma mater suffers, but Sergey Erenburg soars at chess Eastern Open

Virginia GM Sergey Erenburg had a good send-off to 2015, but the same couldn't be said for his alma mater, the University of Maryland-Baltimore County.

January 5, 2016

Market chaos in China produces New Year’s hangover on Wall Street

A sharp drop in stocks in China sent financial markets reeling around the world, with Wall Street just avoiding posting its biggest loss on the first trading day of a new year since the Great Depression.

January 4, 2016

DAVID R. SANDS: Northern Va. stalwart Harold Mouzon dies at 85

Washington chess lost a stalwart earlier this month with the passing of NM Harold Mouzon Jr. of natural causes at the age of 86.

December 29, 2015

DAVID R. SANDS: Big Applesauce: Manhattan wins first chess league crown

From its earliest days of American chess, New York City -- and, in particular, the island of Manhattan -- has been the center of gravity for American chess.

December 22, 2015

Federal Reserve boosts lending rates for first time under Obama

After one of the longest, most telegraphed windups in monetary policy history, the Federal Reserve on Wednesday delivered a small brushback pitch to the American economy, raising its key lending rate by a quarter of a percentage point for the first time since 2006.

December 16, 2015