Kirsan Ilyumzhinov - Personal Life

Personal Life

Ilyumzhinov was born in Elista. His parents, like other Kalmyks, were deported by Joseph Stalin in World War II, and he grew up in Elista after the Kalmyks were allowed to return following Stalin's death. From a young age he became interested in chess, and he won the Kalmykian national chess championship in 1976 at the age of 14. From 1979–80 Ilyumzhinov worked as a mechanic-fitter at the Zvezda plant in Elista. After two years in compulsory national service for the Soviet Army, he returned to the plant as a mechanic for a year, and then studied at the Moscow State Institute of Foreign Relations in 1983–89. In 1989–90 he was sales manager of the Soviet-Japanese automobile company "Liko-Raduga" in Moscow, and in 1990–93 he was President of SAN Corporation in Moscow. Ilyumzhinov acquired his wealth with the emergence of the private sector which followed the collapse of the USSR. He now owns a private jet and six Rolls Royces; he has a black limousine in Moscow, but prefers his white one at home. Kirsan is married to Danara Ilyumzhinova (née Davashkina) and they have one son, David. Ilyumzhinov also has two brothers, Sanal and Vyacheslav.

Ilyumzhinov has drawn world-wide attention for claiming personal contact with aliens, alleging that they took him on a mystical tour of the galaxy in their spaceship in 1997.