Expert: Sinkevičius’ dissertation shows signs of plagiarism

An expert analysis has found that Prime Minister Mindaugas Sinkevičius’ doctoral dissertation contains around ten instances of direct, word-for-word copying from foreign publications, raising concerns about academic ethics, LRT.lt reports.

IT specialist Artūras Paleičikas first highlighted the copied sections on Facebook, noting potential discrepancies. Sinkevičius defended his 2015 dissertation on alcohol consumption habits and causes at ISM University. LRT.lt verified the claims, confirming that the copied passages—approximately ten in total—originate from foreign researchers’ works, including a 2006 document by Thomas A. Wills, Michael G. Ainette, and Carmella Walker, published by the US National Cancer Institute, as well as texts from a scientific blog and a Free University of Berlin researcher.

Some sentences were slightly altered rather than copied verbatim. However, these sections are presented as Sinkevičius’ own text without proper attribution, which may constitute a breach of academic ethics. LRT.lt notes that these are only a few identified examples, and more copied content may exist, as scientific papers are often restricted to closed databases, making full verification difficult.

Chorst Klaus, a plagiarism expert and founder of the platform plag.lt, stated that a preliminary analysis indicates signs of plagiarism in Sinkevičius’ work, though it is not systematic. In one instance, nearly a full page was copied from another source. “We can suspect plagiarism. I wouldn’t say it’s outright plagiarism, but there are sections where large chunks, quotes from other authors, were copied. These are serious cases—if not plagiarism, then at least copying passages. The question is whether it was intentional or compiled from parts,” Klaus said. He added that the work appears “suspicious because there are many matches,” and noted that while general knowledge in academic literature may not require citations, “some parts are too large to be natural with citations.”

Klaus emphasized that ISM University should determine whether the work meets ethical standards. Sinkevičius, when questioned, stated he was “completely calm” and that any errors, if present, were not significant. He noted that the dissertation had been publicly accessible in paper form at the Martynas Mažvydas National Library of Lithuania for 11 years and was only recently digitized. ISM University commented that the dissertation met the ethical standards of the time and that its defense would not be reviewed.

Paleičikas said he decided to examine Sinkevičius’ dissertation after recalling the case of Viktor Uspaskich, whose diploma claims were questioned nearly 20 years ago. He created a special program to check each sentence of the dissertation. Meanwhile, Sinkevičius’ press representative, Gedas Sąlyga, claimed that the copied text in the dissertation was merely “inaccuracies.”