The Ethics Commission Verdict and Required Corrections
The Ethics Commission concluded that Sinkevičius violated the academic honesty principle enshrined in the university’s Code of Ethics and the dissertation independence requirement set out in the Doctoral Regulations. Despite these findings, the commission determined that initiating a procedure to revoke the prime minister’s doctoral degree would be a disproportionate penalty, as the work retains its scientific value. Lrytas noted that the commission mandated a six-month window for Sinkevičius to amend the dissertation after the dean’s office establishes the requirements for a publicly accessible correction appendix within 60 calendar days.
Once completed, the Doctoral Committee will review the corrections and publish the amendment appendix alongside the original work. Should Sinkevičius refuse to address the deficiencies within the specified timeframe, the commission may recommend that ISM University Rector Dalius Misiūnas initiate procedures to revoke the degree.
University Response and Investigation Scope
Rector Dalius Misiūnas stated that the Ethics Commission conducted the investigation responsibly, thoroughly, and professionally while adhering to principles of impartiality and objectivity. Tv3.lt reported that the university launched the inquiry following public discussions over the summer regarding the dissertation—titled “Alcohol Consumption in the Context of Conflicting Social and Personal Factors”—and its initial absence from the electronic thesis and dissertation database.
Following initial textual overlap checks using Turnitin, the commission scrutinized 55 significant matches and discovered that eight sources cited in the text were missing from the bibliography. Delfi detailed that specific findings included verbatim or near-verbatim use of external analyses—such as work by EpiAnalysis regarding Eastern European drinking patterns—without proper citation limits or source attribution.
The Prime Minister Response and Defense of Research
Prime Minister Sinkevičius responded to the verdict by acknowledging the cited citation and referencing failures while maintaining that he stands by the core integrity of his research. In a public statement shared on social media, the prime minister emphasized that the doctoral committee confirmed the scientific value of his thesis and that the ethics commission rejected degree revocation as disproportionate. Alfa.lt reported Sinkevičius’s insistence that he independently formulated hypotheses, gathered data, and analyzed the findings for a project that defense committees and international experts originally evaluated a decade ago.
The university confirmed that no procedural violations occurred during the 2015 defense, leaving the academic degree intact pending the completion of the ordered public corrections.
