BEIJING, December 17 (RIA Novosti) - A total of 93 people were detained in China for spreading doomsday rumors, the official news agency Xinhua said on Monday.
On Saturday four Chinese doom-mongers, preaching through a loudspeaker to people in the streets and distributing leaflets with doomsday warnings, were detained in the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing.
However, it did not stop members of the Almighty God Christian cult from teaching their views. 37 of them were detained on Monday in northwest China's Qinghai Province.
“These cult members recently latched on to the Mayan doomsday scenario to predict the sun will not shine and electricity will not work for three days beginning on December 21,” Xinhua reported, citing the public security bureau of of the provincial capital Xining.
Four "Almighty God" members, suspected of swindling elderly people from remote mountainous areas were also detained in the neighboring Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. They proclaimed that only "Almighty God" followers will survive the doomsday and urged people to join.
The "Almighty God" requires its members to surrender their property to the group.
According to local public security departments, detentions were also made in east China's Fujian Province, southwest China's Chongqing Municipality and Sichuan Province, northwest China's Shaanxi Province and central China's Hubei Province
According to some interpretations of an ancient Maya calendar that are rejected by mainstream science, the world is set to end on December 21, 2012.
