Russian charity 'accidentally advocates beaver genocide'

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A Russian charity has accidently advocated the mass killing of beavers after a typo on one of its mass-produced pamphlets mistakenly told people to exterminate the creatures.

The Mercy Capital Charitable Foundation reportedly commissioned a million Christmas flyers asking people for donations to help needy children.

But instead of asking people to "Do Good", as initially intended, the flyers read "Exterminate Beavers" after intricacies in the Russian language were confused by the printer, according to the Moscow Times.

According to the Lenta.ru website, the caption read: "Exterminate beavers! Text the word 'vremya' and the amount of your donation to SMS number 7715."

The charity reportedly paid 375,000 rubles (£4,582) for the pamphlets and is planning to file a lawsuit against the printing company. who it claims are responsible for the error.

Moscow Printers, however, have purportedly refused to take responsibility for the mistake.

Ivan Makarov, a representative for the foundation, said the company had cited Russian regulations dating back to the Soviet era specifying that minor typos do not qualify as contract violations.

The printing house allegedly told the charity "no one will notice" the error and encouraged them to continue distributing the leaflets.

Mr Makarov said: “As an animal rights activist. I fear that people might really start exterminating beavers if the foundation starts handing out leaflets like these, the way they are now.”