FIRST: The Pakistani Law Minister (equivalent of Attorney General or Minister of Justice) Babar Awan…  

Dawn:  Status of Babar Awan’s alma mater in doubt 7-13-2010

WASHINGTON: The university from where Law Minister Babar Awan claims to have done his PhD is banned in the United States from issuing any degree and cannot even claim that it is a legal educational institution.

Long before the dispute over fake degrees became a political issue in Pakistan, the Circuit Court of the First Circuit in the State of Hawaii, declared that the University of Monticello was a non-recognised and non-chartered university.

The university previously claimed that it was based in Hawaii, which prompted the court to issue this order (No. 99-2769-07) on March 13, 2000.

The court banned the university from “representing, directly or by implication, that they offer real learning, real achievement, real recognition, real accreditation, real degrees and real value”.

The Monticello University is also banned from “representing, directly or by implication, that they have staff, faculty and personnel”.

The court also ordered Mr Awan’s alma mater from claiming “directly or by implication, that Monticello is a legally qualified, non-profit, degree-granting institution of higher education, in the State of South Dakota and Hawaii, and that its degrees have the legal status as degrees from any other legally-qualified American university”.

SB: Two 'universities' named in lawsuit (Monticello)

http://hawaii.gov/dcca/ocp/udgi/lawsuits/monticello

SECOND: Former President of Microsoft China Tang Jun

Digital East Asia: Former Microsoft China President and Shanda CEO Tang Jun Embroiled in Fake Diploma Controversy 7-13-2010

This is one of the most entertaining Internet stories to come out of China in a while, and it is really full of Chinese characteristics – all the bad ones, unfortunately.  Tang Jun, who was once heralded as the “emperor of professional managers” for his high profile roles – former president of Microsoft China (NASDAQ: MSFT) and CEO of Shanda Interactive Entertainment Ltd. ((ADR) NASDAQ: SNDA) – is currently at the center of a massive controversy over his diploma.

QQ has a short summary (link in Chinese) of the event’s development – on July 1st, Fang Zhouzi, a biology PhD who is famous for exposing plagiarism and fabrications in Chinese academia, commented in a series of posts on his Sina Weibo (microblog) that Tang Jun had lied about his education and his patents in his autobiography, “My Success Can Be Replicated” (book name my translation). In the book, Tang had said he held a PhD from Caltech.

Tang initially refused to respond to Fang’s allegations, but on July 6 he stated in public that he has never claimed to hold a PhD from Caltech; instead, his doctor’s degree is from Pacific Western University. Unfortunately, that only fueled the flame, as Fang quickly pointed out that Pacific Western University is a “fake” university with a controversial history and was shut down by the State of Hawaii (check out the wikipedia link) – essentially, this is an institution engaged in the business of selling diplomas and wasn’t accredited. Tang then responded that he went to the other Pacific Western University, the one in California, not in Hawaii; but Fang quickly responded that the two shared the same ownership prior to 2006 (as the wikipedia articles show)….

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Western_University_(Hawaii)