It was a Candidates Tournament for the 1954 World Chess Championship, which led to the match between Smyslov and Mikhail Botvinnik.
In May 2022 Yuri Averbakh died at the age of 100, having been the last living player to have played in the tournament.
In later years, Bronstein claimed that the Soviet players were accompanied by KGB agents.
According to Bronstein, during the tournament, the KGB handlers started to worry that the American candidate, Samuel Reshevsky, would win, and began pressuring some of the Soviet players to throw their games against Smyslov, who was leading the other Soviet players in points.
[1] Bronstein, David (1979) [1960], Zurich International chess tournament, 1953 (2nd ed.