Chinese police are offering cash rewards for clues that could lead them to more than 100 people, as public demonstrations swept through cities in Inner Mongolia over the introduction of the Mandarin language in some school lessons.
The police bureau of Tongliao, a city in the autonomous region bordering Mongolia and Russia, on Wednesday published photographs and detailed descriptions of dozens of people it accused of “picking quarrels and causing troubles.”
The police said that the people had committed the crimes between Sunday and Tuesday, the same period the unrest broke out.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Horqin District police issued a separate notice calling for information on dozens of people.
The search comes as government efforts to change the language of instruction of some subjects to Mandarin from Mongolian have prompted parents and students to boycott classes, and take to the streets in protest.
Authorities have used similar techniques to dilute the cultures of ethnic minorities in Tibet, Xinjiang and Guangdong.
Videos from human rights groups showed people chanting demands in Tongliao, which has a significant Mongolian population.
The Mandarin-language classes started on Tuesday, beginning with language and literature classes for selected grades. The rollout would later cover two other subjects — morality and law, and history.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) has urged the overhaul of education in the three subjects where changes have taken place in Inner Mongolia in a bid to “safeguard ideological security.”
Local education authorities on Monday said in a statement that Mandarin would only be used to teach the three subjects that are part of the new rollout, and that the current bilingual system of instruction had not been changed.
One man wanted by the police has been accused of “breaking police cordons” on Sunday in the city’s Economic and Technology Development Zone, according to one of the notices.
Horqin District police issued a separate notice through WeChat seeking information on 129 people for the same accusation of “picking quarrels and causing troubles.”
The notices all promised cash rewards of 1,000 yuan (US$146) for anyone who provided reliable information on their identities. Tongliao police also urged the people to surrender themselves.
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