Update | Hundreds demonstrate outside Taiwan’s education ministry after student’s suicide

Demonstrators call for education minister to resign after student arrested for breaking into ministry, in protest over "pro-Beijing" curriculum changes, takes his own life

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Protesters gathered outside the education ministry. Photo: AFP

Published: 10:00am, 31 Jul 2015Updated: 10:27am, 31 Jul 2015

Hundreds of protesters gathered in Taipei early on Friday calling for the education minister to resign after a student committed suicide, amid a deepening row over the island’s “mainland China-centric” school curriculum.

Several hundred people, some holding white roses and candles, congregated outside the education ministry at midnight to bid farewell to 20-year-old Lin Kuan-hua, who police said killed himself at his New Taipei City home on Thursday morning.

Lin was reportedly one of 30 students, along with three journalists, who were arrested last week for breaking into the ministry in anger at controversial changes to the high school curriculum, which students say favour mainland China’s view of the island’s history.

“We will not let Lin Kuan-hua die in vain!” Chu Chen, a spokesman for the student protest group, told the growing crowd, as chants calling for Education Minister Wu Se-hwa to step down rang out.

As the hours passed with no response from Wu, a group of about 700 angry students broke down part of a fence around the ministry and took over a square in front of the building.

Later the crowds began to thin, leaving only a core of some 200 people in the square, still chanting “step down minister” and “retract the curriculum”. The group vowed to remain until morning.