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The backgrounds of 3,000 foreign doctors are being urgently checked after a conwoman with no qualifications was allowed to work as an NHS psychiatrist for 22 years.

Zholia Alemi, 56, claimed to have a degree from the University of Auckland in New Zealand when she came to work in the UK in 1992. 

In reality, the convicted fraudster had flunked her first year and dropped out.

But nobody at the General Medical Council, the watchdog responsible for vetting the background of medics, checked whether her documentation was genuine.