Harikrishna maintains lead

India's Grandmaster Pendyala Harikrishna drew with third seed Evgeny Alekseev of Russia in the sixth round and maintained his lead with 5.5 points in the World Junior Chess Championship in Kochi on Monday.

Harikrishna, who had earlier in the day defeated fourth seed Tigran Petrosian Tigran (Armenia) in 57 moves in the fifth round, signed the peace pact in 20 moves.

Grandmaster Petrosian defeated Grandmaster Yuri Drozdovsky of Ukraine in French defence in 35 moves while IM Radoslaw of Poland held India's GM Koneru Humpy to a draw in 59 moves.

Zao Jun of China defeated India's IM M R Venkatesh in a Sicilian defence in 38 moves and top seed Ferenc Berkes of Hungary beat IM Elshan Moradiabadi of Iran in 32 moves.

In the World girls' championship, which was also played along with the junior meet, Ukranian WGM Anna Ushenina and WGM Elisabeth Paehtz of Germany, with five points each, jointly lead the table after six rounds.

In the sixth round, on the top board, Anna Ushenina held second seed Paehtz to a draw in a queens pawn opening in 11 moves while Dana Aketayeva of Kazakhstan was held to a draw by

India's medal hope Eesha Karavade in 73 moves.

In another game, top seed Ekaterina Korbut of Russia defeated Vinuthna of India in Pirc defence in 25 moves while Zhang Jilin of China and Joanna Majdan of Poland agreed for a draw in 61 moves.