The body of Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin should stay in its mausoleum on Red Square in Moscow, so long as Russians retain personal memories of the Soviet period, President Vladimir Putin said today.

Axar.az reports citing Malaymail that asked at his annual press conference whether the embalmed body of the first Soviet leader, who died in 1924, should be removed, Putin said his position had not changed but also criticized the way Lenin set up the USSR.

“In my view, we should not touch this, at least while we have very many people who connect their own lives with this... connect this with achievements of the past, of the Soviet years,” said Putin.

Liberals regularly raise the question of removing Lenin’s body for burial and more than 60 percent of Russians support this according to a 2017 survey by VTsIOM state pollster.