Tsar-fetched? Almost a third of Russians favor return of monarchy

A recent poll has shown that 28 percent of Russian citizens want their country to be again ruled by Tsars, and 13 percent suggest a current politician could claim the throne.

The research has been done by the All-Russian Center for Public Opinion. The results were announced by the head of this organization, Valery Fedorov, at a Moscow conference dedicated to the 400th anniversary of the Romanov Russian royal house.

According to Fedorov, 28 percent of Russians support the restoration of monarchy or said they would not object to it.

At the same time, only six percent said that a modern monarch must be from the Romanov dynasty.  About 13 percent hold that a contemporary Russian politician could become a new Tsar and suggested a nationwide referendum to decide who. Only four percent admitted they had a favorite candidate but almost all monarchists agreed that the future Tsar must be an Orthodox Christian. 80 percent of all respondents said that no living Russian politician or public figure was worthy of the throne.

At the same time, 67 percent of those polled said that Russia should leave monarchy in the past and 82 percent agreed that the current republican constitution is the best for the country.

Russia was ruled by absolute monarchs from the mid-sixteenth century with Ivan IV the Terrible until the early 20th century. The last Emperor, Nicholas II abdicated after the Great October Socialist Revolution in 1917 and was executed by Bolsheviks together with his family in 1918.