Thousands in Hong Kong rally against curriculum

Thousands of teachers, parents, students and activists demonstrated over the weekend against proposed Chinese national education in Hong Kong schools, just before the academic year was set to begin Monday.

According to The South China Morning Post , three teenagers were told to end a hunger strike for health reasons, though they were replaced by 10 other protesters. Critics of the curriculum have likened it to brainwashing.

Organizers, including Scholarism , a student advocacy group, said that there were 40,000 protesters. The police in the semiautonomous Chinese city reported a vastly different number of more than 8,000 protesters.

The protest against what is being called “patriotic education” followed a larger rally in late July.

— JOYCE LAU