Russian royal pushes fight for Tsar's exoneration: lawyer

MOSCOW (AFP) — A descendant of Russia's Romanov royal family has lodged new court appeals seeking official recognition that the last Russian tsar was killed for political reasons, a family lawyer said Friday.

Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna, a Romanov descendant who considers herself the rightful heir to Tsar Nicholas II, wants Russia to formally recognise that the killing of her ancestors was a political crime, said her lawyer, German Lukyanov, speaking before the 90th anniversary of the killings on July 17.

"Russia, according to the constitution, is a lawful state.... And yet this lawful state currently considers the totalitarian Soviet state didn't infringe the rights and freedoms of the royal family, believes what happened to them was the actions of bandits and hooligans," Lukyanov told journalists.

The duchess lodged an appeal on Thursday with a consultative body of the supreme court, the presidium, demanding it overturn a previous ...