A record seven in 10 Russians now view Joseph Stalin positively, a poll has found.

An annual survey by the independent Levada Centre showed that 52 per cent thought the architect of the Great Purge had played a "more positive" role in the country's history and 18 per cent an "entirely positive" role.

The 70 per cent approval of Stalin is 21 per cent higher than a decade ago.

It is also better than Vladimir Putin's approval rating of 62 per cent, as measured by a state pollster this month. His popularity slipped several points after an unpopular pension age hike was announced last year.

Only 19 per cent of those polled thought Stalin, who headed the Soviet Union for more than two decades until his death in 1953, had played a “more negative” or “definitely negative” role.

Respondents were almost evenly split on whether the human casualties under the iron-fisted leader were “justified” by the “grand goals and results” achieved.

While 15 million were killed in prisons and labour camps under Stalin, a state commission estimated after the Soviet collapse, in recent years the “generalissimo” has seen a gradual rehabilitation. In school books and on state television is now often given credit for cracking down on corruption, industrialising the country and defeating the Nazis.