He’s a multimillionaire businessman, the leader of the only Buddhist region in Europe, and head of FIDE.

But Kirsan Ilyumzhinov has another claim to fame – he says was abducted by aliens who landed a spaceship on his balcony in 1997.

Even though 13 years have gone by – including four since The Guardian reported his close encounter of the third kind – he’s back in the Earth news big time.

Mr Ilyumzhinov, 48, the head of the south-western Russian region of Kalmykia, appeared on a Russian talk show on April 26, and went over his evening with aliens again.

He said he saw a “semi-transparent half tube” spaceship on his balcony. He then entered it and met “human-like creatures in yellow spacesuits”, The Moscow Times reported.

“I am often asked which language I used to talk to them. Perhaps it was on a level of the exchange of the ideas,” he told the television program host.

He had told The Guardian the aliens took him to “some kind of star”.

“They put a spacesuit on me, told me many things and showed me around. They wanted to demonstrate that UFOs do exist.”

What has got his Russian political peers suddenly agitated after all this time is whether he let slip any state secrets and whether there is a proper procedure for dealing with aliens.

Andrei Lebedev, a State Duma deputy, was apparently moved by “holy terror” at Mr Ilyumzhinov’s claims, and yesterday wrote to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev asking him to launch an investigation, the Times said.

He was concerned about whether Mr Ilyumzhinov’s brush with the spacemen affected his ruling of Kalmykia and whether they might have tried to get him to divulge state secrets to them.

Mr Lebedev also wanted the Russian leader to clarify what guidelines officials were to follow if they were nabbed by aliens.

They put a spacesuit on me, told me many things and showed me around. They wanted to demonstrate that UFOs do exist

Mr Ilyumzhinov is no stranger to controversy.

In 1993, he was elected to the top political post in Kalmykia at just 30 when he pledged to give shepherds a mobile phone and $US100 each.

He turned the semi-autonomous region into a chess destination, building the $US50 million Chess City complex that has played host to numerous world chess championships.

But Mr Ilyumzhinov has been accused by critics of acting as a dictator of both impoverished Kalmykia and of FIDE.

He also said the late Iraqi president Saddam Hussein was “a normal person, a politician who cheered for his republic and wanted to do good things for people” and calls eccentric Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi a friend, The Guardian reported.

Source: Sydney Morning Herald