A member of the Jehovah’s Witnesses who had proclaimed himself God and set himself on fire in Moscow region on Monday has died, local Investigative Committee reported on Thursday.
The incident took place in the village of Nakhabino 33 kilometers (20.5 miles) outside Moscow on Monday after the man bought fuel, poured it on himself and set himself ablaze.
“The burns the victim suffered were very serious and could not be survived. He died in intensive care at the regional hospital,” a source in law enforcement said.
The man's son said his 43-year-old father had been a member of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and considered himself to be God.
Investigators are probing the cause of the man’s suicide.
The Jehovah's Witnesses, which has some seven million followers worldwide and over 200,000 in Russia, have already been banned in a number of Russian regions and in some former Soviet republics.
The Jehovah's Witnesses branch in the Russian capital was dissolved by a district court ruling in 2004, but the European Court of Human Rights declared the decision illegal in 2011.
The religion is banned in China, North Korea, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq and other countries.
