Mircea Geoană Responds to Accusations of Plagiarizing Doctoral Thesis

NATO deputy secretary general, Romanian Mircea Geoană, who might run for Presidency, is accused of plagiarizing in the doctoral thesis he defended, almost 20 years ago, at ASE Bucharest, according to the PressOne publication. This shows that the potential candidate for the position of president of Romania copied at least 78 pages out of the 279 and resorted to the technique: plagiarism through translation. Mircea Geoană would have translated dozens of pages from the annual reports presented to the US Congress by American presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush and integrated them into his doctoral thesis. None of the works are cited or listed in the bibliography.

The non-governmental organization “România Renaște”, which supports and promotes Mircea Geoană, presented, on Friday, during a press conference, a call for the current Deputy Secretary General of NATO to run for this year’s presidential elections. The message was presented by the leader of the movement, university professor Dumitru Borţun, who stated that Mircea Geoană could resign from the position in the North Atlantic Alliance after the NATO summit in Washington, which will take place between July 9-11.

Mircea Geoană reacted on Facebook to the accusations that he plagiarized his doctoral thesis, presented 20 years ago. He links the accusations published by PressOne to the discussions in the public space about his possible candidacy in the presidential elections. “From the series, search until you find it, and if you don’t find it, invent it,” says Geoană.

“From the series search until you find, and if you can’t find, invent, today I find myself accused of plagiarism of the doctoral thesis I completed 20 years ago. why today Probably because some were scared by the discussions in the public space about a possible candidacy of mine. Specialists in the field have already publicly commented on a thesis I have been working on for years. When multiple anti-plagiarism software says there are no similarities and yet someone finds themselves coming up with a false accusation, I can only think of bad intent or bad faith. Leaving aside my personal opinions about what I should have written in the thesis (I didn’t know it was a collective work and I have to ask the opinion of people who are not specialists in the field!), basically, the mentioned and the concept of plagiarism are things totally different. I will always be a promoter of values ​​of any kind, but at the same time I cannot help sanctioning intellectual imposture with political valences and intentions. I expected such dirty attacks as, for 3 months, certain television stations have been running a smear campaign against me. Another fake news campaign is nothing new under the sun. I have behind me a career of studies in the country and abroad in engineering, law, public administration, economics. I did this doctorate not to have a buttonhole flower or out of the need to occupy some position, but out of intellectual curiosity and the desire to know and improve myself continuously. I will not allow anyone, for purely electoral and obviously politically motivated reasons, to question a life of work and studies done at the highest level of probity and professionalism”, says the message published by Mircea Geoană on Facebook.

Emilia Sercan retorts