The junta has arrested seven people, including three officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, for aiding and abetting a junior doctor who joined the nationwide Civil Disobedience Movement.
The regime in a statement Monday said the detainees were involved in facilitating the notary service and verifying the notary-translated certificates of Ma Kay Zin Tun, who graduated from Mandalay Medical University in 2020.
On Feb. 3, 2021, just two days after the military coup, hundreds of doctors and nurses from hospitals in Mandalay and Yangon launched the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM), which was later joined by thousands of government employees, including police officers and soldiers refusing to work for the military regime.
The regime said the doctor left the country illegally “without completing her responsibilities” and attempted to study in Dubai using a certificate from a school called the University of Medicine, Mandalay, which was set up under the imprimatur of the civilian National Unity Government’s Ministry of Education.
She had been admitted to further her studies in surgery at the NUG-affiliated school.
The NUG is a coalition of democratic forces in Myanmar, including stakeholders from the country’s ethnic groups. The regime has labeled it a terrorist organization.
The regime said it discovered Dr. Kay Zin Tun’s certificate was issued by the NUG-affiliated “illegal medical university” after the now regime-controlled Mandalay Medical University received a request from the Data Flow Group in Dubai for verification of the certificates used in an application to study in Dubai.
Data Flow Group is a background screening company for employers and universities.
The regime said it arrested four notary service providers including a lawyer from Yangon for notarizing her credentials.
It also arrested the deputy director of the Foreign Ministry’s Yangon notary division, General Aung Kyaw Moe, and two other officials for verifying them.
It threatened “effective action” against the detainees.
The regime also urged parents to send their children only to official universities and not any schools and online institutions affiliated with the NUG.
The junta has also cracked down on online schools run by NUG, arresting students and teachers, while its warplanes bombarded schools and hospitals run by the NUG and other anti-regime organizations across the country.
The military has arrested many doctors who joined the CDM and shut down several private hospitals for employing them.
