Local children's rights commissioners from across Russia beg Putin not to accept Pavel Astakhov's resignation

Children’s rights commissioners from all over Russia have written an open letter to President Putin asking him not to accept the resignation of Pavel Astakhov, Russia's children's right commissioner.

The letter’s authors enumerate all of the work that Astakhov has done while in office and insist that they know him better than those who seek “yet again” to “bring him down.” The campaign against him, they argue, relies on “lies and slander.”

Pavel Astakhov submitted his resignation to the Kremlin after facing widespread criticism for comments he made to young girls who survived the recent tragedy at Lake Syamozero in Karelia, which left 10 children dead on June 19. Astakhov began his meeting with the survivors with the awkward icebreaker: “How was your swim?”

He later claimed his words were taken out of context and explained that he was trying to use special “psychological techniques” to extract important information for the investigation.