Call to Remove Name of Tsar's Killer From District

It is one of the most famous murders in history. On the night of July 16-17 1918 a group of Bolsheviks burst into the house where Russia's tsar Nicholas II was being held. Acting on Lenin's orders, they murdered the entire royal family - the tsar, his wife, their children, and three servants.

But 90 years after the tsar's killing, Russia's orthodox church has called for the man who killed the tsar, Piotr Voikov, to be brought to account. The church yesterday said it was wrong that one of Moscow's districts, Voikovskaya, should be named after Voikov, a leading Bolshevik.

"So far the state hasn't called the killing of the tsar's family a crime," said Vsevolod Chaplin, spokesman for Moscow's patriarch. "It hasn't passed moral judgment on those who ordered the execution, approved it, and carried it out, or on those who imprisoned and held the royal family.

"It's time for the state to make some symbolic decision. Without this it will be difficult for Russia to free itself from the historical stain on its conscience."

Details of the tsar's execution in the town of Yekaterinburg in the southern Urals initially remained secret. But Voikov, who became the Soviet ambassador to Poland, later wrote a memoir describing his murderous role.

After Voikov was himself assassinated in 1927, he became a state hero. He lent his name to a district in the north-west of the city and a busy metro station.