Is Justin Bieber retiring? His tweet says he is...

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Justin Bieber arrives for the world premiere of "Justin Bieber's BELIEVE". PHOTO/AFP

LOS ANGELES - Teen pop megastar Justin Bieber has set Twitter ablaze with a message suggesting he may be stepping away from the stage -- just as his new movie hits theaters on Christmas Day.

"My beloved beliebers I'm officially retiring," the 19-year-old Bieber said on Twitter to his nearly 48 million followers.

The message has been retweeted more than 240,000 times and comments from fans flooded the globally popular messaging site.

But a subsequent tweet from the Canadian teen idol left some doubt about his future plans.

"The media talks a lot about me. They make a up a lot of lies and want me to fail but I'm never leaving you, being a belieber is a lifestyle," he wrote.

Then, Bieber tweeted a trailer for his latest movie, "Justin Bieber's Believe," which opens in US theaters on Wednesday, and "Merry Christmas everyone. Be kind to one another."

He told a Los Angeles radio station last week that he was "quitting music, quitting everything," saying: "I'm going to go (play) golf."

The singer has recently run into trouble during his "Believe" tour in both Brazil and Australia, where he was accused of spraying graffiti on hotel walls.

He caused outrage in Argentina by stepping on an Argentine flag thrown onto the stage during a concert. And he was photographed in Rio de Janeiro leaving a notorious brothel.

AFP