turkmenistan's loopy president

this is truly amazing: a forum 18 (religious freedom watchdog) article on the personality cult of the president of turkmenistan. an excerpt:

Although the president's cult of personality – which includes a gold statue in Ashgabad that revolves to follow the sun and a monument to the Ruhnama – began in the mid-1990s, the cult was stepped up after the publication of the first volume of the Ruhnama [a book written by the president] in 2001, which [President] Niyazov described at the launch ceremony as a "holy book". Officials later likened it to the Koran. The second Ruhnama volume was ceremonially launched in September 2004. In 2000, one government claimed that the Ruhnama would make up for shortcomings in both the Bible and the Koran, neither of which were, he claimed, fully adequate for the spiritual needs of Turkmens.

and it just gets crazier from there.