Prime minister’s representative confirms Sinkevičius’s dissertation was publicly defended

The representative of Lithuania’s prime minister has confirmed that Mindaugas Sinkevičius’s doctoral dissertation was written, publicly defended, and remains accessible at the National Library of Lithuania.

Gedas Salyga, the prime minister’s representative, told the Baltic News Service (BNS) that the work was prepared and defended in public, and is available at the National M. Mažvydas Library, LRT reports.

ISM University of Management and Economics, where Sinkevičius earned his doctorate, noted that the dissertation had not been uploaded to the Lithuanian Academic Electronic Library (eLABA) and contacted Sinkevičius, who then signed an agreement to make the work publicly available in the system.

Recent public discussions have focused on why the dissertation was not accessible in eLABA. Further scrutiny has also examined the submission details of another of his academic papers. Archival researcher Daiva Vilkelytė claimed on Facebook that Sinkevičius listed a second required research article as published a year earlier than it actually was.

Sinkevičius holds a bachelor’s degree in management and business administration from Vilnius University (2007), a bachelor’s in law from Mykolas Romeris University (2008), and a master’s in marketing and management from ISM (2009). He defended his doctoral dissertation at ISM in 2015.