Former chess great Bobby Fischer has finally received his temporary residence permit from Iceland. The Icelandic ambassador to Japan, Thordur Oskarsson, delivered the permit to Fischer a day after Fischer’s former bodyguard, Saemundur Pálsson, visited him in prison.
He lost weight and grew lots of hair, said Pálsson, who saw his friend for the first time in nearly 30 years.
“He looked like Leonardo Da Vinci,” Pálsson said.
Fischer is being held in a Japanese prison, awaiting possible extradition to the US. He is wanted by the US for breaking UN sanctions in 1992 by playing a chess match in then-Yugoslavia.