Education authorities in Inner Mongolia have denied allegations that a new curriculum would replace the Mongolian language with Mandarin Chinese, amid widespread protests by parents and students against cultural assimilation.

In a question-and-answer session, the Inner Mongolia Education Ministry said that classes teaching the Mongolian language — the mother tongue for around 4.2 million ethnic Mongolians in the autonomous region — would continue to be a compulsory subject.

Ethnic Mongolian students in the northern Chinese region have staged class boycotts in response to a new policy by the central government, which changed the language of instruction from Mongolian to Mandarin in three subjects for primary and secondary schools.

China’s central government had the legal authority to impose curriculum changes and the local government must implement them resolutely, the Inner Mongolian Education Ministry said.

The curriculum changes affected three subjects: literature, ethics and history. The new materials focused more on patriotism, socialist values, cultural unity and revolutionary traditions, according to authorities.

The Chinese syllabus will only be taught to students entering the first year of primary and secondary schools, and the language arrangements for other courses will remain unchanged, authorities said.

Separately, the public security bureau of Bairin Left Banner said in a statement that three civil servants were penalized for refusing to implement the new curriculum.

The civil servants were penalized “in accordance with the law” after they displayed signs of resistance and tried to hinder the authorities. The public security bureau did not specify the penalties that were issued.

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