BEIJING (Reuters):

The vice-principal of a Chinese Communist Party training school said she has been demoted for organising a Bible study session, the latest case of Christians being punished for worshipping outside party parameters.

Geng Sude, 55, a Protestant, was told on February 5 that she was being stripped of her party membership and of her title of vice-principal of the Party School in Baoding, a city in Hebei province neighbouring Beijing.

"I did not break the law. I did not say anything anti-government or anti-China," Geng told Reuters. She vowed to appeal to provincial party authorities.

She retains her professorship in philosophy, but it was unclear whether the school would give her any classes to teach.

About 100 police stormed the 10th-floor auditorium of the Party School in Baoding on January 1 and broke up the Bible study session that she had organised.

About 50 Christian attendees, including lawyers, professors, authors, journalists and artists, were detained and questioned by police for hours and their belongings searched.