Serdal Gunduz, the 30 per cent shareholder and secretary-general of the now-infamous Cyprus Health and Social Sciences University (KSTU) in Morphou, was charged with 130 more counts of fraud, document forgery, and other related crimes on Thursday.

Gunduz appeared in court in Morphou alongside the KSTU’s international office manager Amir Shakerifard as part of the preliminary inquest into the scandal, with both charged with the same 130 counts.

These charges are separate from the 98 charges of fraud, falsifying documents, money laundering, and other similar crimes, of which Gunduz and his assistant Berke Ozbek stand accused in another court in northern Nicosia.

Gunduz was initially arrested at the beginning of March and has remained in custody ever since – a fact to which Zeki has repeatedly objected.

However, whenever objections were raised, courts consistently ruled that Gunduz is a flight risk as he holds residence permits in Greece and Russia.

The “fake diploma scandal” rocked the north’s higher education system during the first half of the year, with a raft of high-profile arrests having been made in connection with alleged forgeries of documents, bribery, and money laundering.

However, the damage done by the scandal is already seemingly having an impact on the north’s universities, with the number of new students being registered at the north’s universities this academic year 11 per cent lower than last year.