Iceland's Supreme Court said today that three tissue samples were required to determine whether he was the father of 9-year-old Jinky Young, a Philippines-born girl whose mother has filed a claim on Fischer's estate.
The ruling overturned an earlier municipal court decision denying the request by the girl's mother, Marilyn Young, saying exhumation was "unavoidable," Reuters reported.
John Lent, AP
The remains of chess genius Bobby Fischer, shown here in a 1962, are to be exhumed to determine whether he is the father of a 9-year-old girl, a lawyer representing the child and her mother said Thursday.
But even if the finding favors Young, she still faces a battle over Fischer's estate, which is estimated to be worth $2 million and is subject to competing claims. Miyoko Watai, the head of the Japanese Chess Association, says she legally married Fischer in 2004, and two of the Chicago-born champion's nephews say they are entitled to the money.
In addition, the U.S. government is also claiming payment of unpaid taxes, Agence France-Press reported.
The reclusive Fischer, who reportedly left no will, became the only American world chess champion in 1972 by defeating the Soviet Union's grand master Boris Spassky.
He became a fugitive from justice in the U.S. in 1992 after he violated sanctions against Yugoslavia by accepting a $3.3 million fee to play an exhibition game there.
After dropping out of sight and living in Budapest, the Philippines and Switzerland, he was arrested and held for months in Japan for what Tokyo said was an attempt to fly to Manila without a valid passport.
It was then that Iceland, which regarded Fischer as a national hero for his victory over Spassky in Reykjavik, came to his rescue.
Because it saw his win as a triumph for democracy over communism, Iceland made Fischer a citizen, and he moved there from Japan in 2005 to avoid being deported to the U.S.
Fischer, who died Jan. 17, 2008, at the age of 64, was buried in a church cemetery south of the Icelandic capital.
Although seen by many as one of the world's greatest-ever chess players, Fischer refused to defend his title and relinquished it to the Soviet champion Anatoly Karpov in 1975.