China has launched a crackdown on a cult calling for a "decisive battle" to slay the "Red Dragon" Communist Party, and which has been spreading doomsday rumors.
The group called "Almighty God," also known as "Oriental Lightning," claims "a new age dominated by the Almighty God has approached" and those who didn't believed it would be killed by lightning, Shaanxi-based Chinese Business View reported yesterday.
The Shaanxi Daily newspaper said on its website that the cult's followers had been distributing leaflets saying the world would end in 2012.
"The State Bureau of Religious Affairs has already documented the group's cult nature, has outlawed it and is presently harshly cracking down," the newspaper said. It did not say how many followers there were.
The cult, founded by Zhao Weisheng, emerged in central China's Henan Province in early 1990s and then spread to Shanxi, Shaanxi and Gansu provinces and Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Regions in north and northwest parts of China, according to the Chinese Business View report.
It took many concepts from the Bible and distorted them for evil purposes, the report said.
The group operates like a pyramid scheme with a "goddess" at the top and "leaders" at the bottom who are encouraged to enroll other members.
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