Almost 70,000 people signed a petition for the resignation of Children's Rights Commissioner Pavel Astakhov, posted on the Change.org website on Friday, by 1:00 p.m. Moscow time on Saturday, June 25.

The petition is addressed to Russian President Vladimir Putin. The authors of the petition recall that on Wednesday, during a visit to children who survived the tragedy on Syamozero, Astakhov asked one of the teenagers a question about how rescuers took the children from the island where they were washed up by the waves. "Having received the answer that the Emergencies Ministry employees took the children out on boats, the children's ombudsman asked with a smile on his face: "So, how was your swim?" the text says.

"We regard this statement as an inhuman and disgusting manifestation of the narrow-mindedness, callousness and cynicism of a person whose job responsibilities include protecting the rights and interests of children in Russia," the authors of the petition write. "Such qualities are incompatible with the position of children's rights commissioner," they believe.

The appeal states that Astakhov should be immediately relieved of his duties as the Commissioner for Children's Rights under the President of Russia, and that society and the state should give this statement an objective assessment.

In a conversation with the Life portal, Astakhov said : “Change.org is registered in San Francisco, are we now going to express public opinion on American sites?” He also emphasized that the site “is visited by a large number of electronic bots, there is no need to register there.”

"When they write that Russians are voting there, excuse me, I can even see on my Instagram that 90% of them are coming from Ukrainian sites to write some nasty stuff. I can only respond with work - I continue to work," noted the Commissioner for Children's Rights under the President of Russia.

Petition for Astakhov's resignation has collected almost 70,000 signatures