Updated

The governor of a Russian republic and former president of the World Chess Federation told a TV station that he had been abducted by aliens, who communicated with him telepathically.

The Russian government apparently believes him.

Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the governor of Kalmykia, told a popular Russian television host that the aliens came for him in his apartment on September 18, 1997. According to a report on ABC News, Ilyumzhinov said that the aliens didn’t make themselves known to the rest of the world because they weren’t ready, adding that he communicated with them telepathically because there wasn’t enough oxygen.

“I believe I talked to them and saw them. I perhaps wouldn’t believe it if it wasn’t for 3 witnesses -- my driver, my minister and my assistant,” who were apparently in the apartment at the time, he reportedly said.

According to a report on Russian news website GZT.ru, State Duma deputy Andrei Lebedev doesn’t believe that the governor was simply shown around the alien spaceship and released. Lebedev wants to find out what else happened to the president -- and he wants Russian president Dmitry Medvedev to interrogate the abductee.

Russian officials fear Ilyumzhinov may have given the aliens “secret information,” according to the Echo of Moscow radio station.