Uni against Politicising of Its Statement on Danko's Rigorous Thesis

Uni against Politicising of Its Statement on Danko's Rigorous Thesis

Bratislava, January 18 (TASR) – Academia should be apolitical, despite society’s efforts towards the opposite, stated the Bratislava-based Comenius University (UK) on Friday, objecting to interpretations of its statement on Thursday (January 17) concerning the rigorous thesis of Parliamentary Chair Andrej Danko (Slovak National Party/SNS).

“Comenius University by its statement on Thursday in no way intended to join the debate on the domestic political arena, and it protests against interpretations that attempt to foist this intention on it,” stated the university management. Despite efforts to politicise it, the university wants society to respect and honour the principle of apolitical academic territory.
According to the university’s statement, Parliamentary Chair Danko failed to observe elementary ethical rules that have been in place in academia for centuries when drafting his rigorous thesis.
A special commission of Matej Bel University’s (UMB) Academic Senate set up to investigate suspicions of plagiarism in rigorous theses at UMB said on January 11 that the pair of rigorous theses reported on in the media “contain parts that are slightly modified in comparison with the source literature, but most of them also show a high degree of alignment with the source literature, while divisions into chapters and sub-chapters of the original sources have been preserved in some places.”