ST.PETERSBURG, July 14. /TASS/. Cossacks in Russia’s second largest city of St. Petersburg want Pokemon Go game, which has become sensationally popular across the globe, to be banned in Russia, the city’s local radio station Baltika said Thursday.

"People should be dragged out of this virtual world, it reeks of Satanism. There are so many interesting things to do and people are just wasting their lives," the radio quoted Cossack leader Andrei Polyakov as saying.

He said Cossacks would send letters to the Russian consumer watchdog, the Federal Anti-Monopoly Service and Apple asking them to ban the game, which mergers virtual reality with real life.

The augmented reality game launched by Nintendo and Google on July 6 has been dominating the download charts in the US, Australia and New Zealand and has reportedly become more popular than Twitter and Tinder, a location-based dating app.

The Pokemon Go app allows players to roam about their neighborhoods catching Pokemon creatures by using smartphone cameras and tracking their location in the real world. Sometimes the game lures its users into quite unusual places like hospital or cemeteries.

Vedomosti business daily reported earlier on Thursday that the game could be officially launched in Russia by July 17.