The chief of the Romanian Foreign Intelligence Service (SIE), Gabriel Vlase’s Ph.D. thesis contains 66 pages of heavily plagiarized content from the thesis of former Defense Minister Sorin Frunzăverde.
The plagiarized content comes from a single source: another Ph.D. thesis, defended in 2004 at the National Defense University „Carol I” (UNAP), under the Ministry of National Defense, specifically from the thesis of Sorin Frunzăverde, former Defense Minister in the Mugur Isărescu (2000) and Călin Popescu Tăriceanu (2006-2007) governments, as revealed by journalist Emilia Șercan in Press One.
The work that earned the scientific title of Ph.D. for the SIE chief was defended in 2010 at the National Intelligence Academy "Mihai Viteazul" of the Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI).
Gabriel Vlase was supervised by Constantin Onișor, at that time the dean of the most important faculty within the SRI Academy, the Information faculty.
The committee of three referees who evaluated and decided to award Vlase the Ph.D. title was composed of Luca Iamandi (professor at the Police Academy), Constantin Țenu (professor at the National Defense University), and Gheorghe Toma (professor at the SRI Academy).
Vlase published his Ph.D. thesis in 2010, the year in which he publicly defended the work, at RAO Publishing House. The book, printed also in the fall of 2010, has a different title from the thesis: Security in Southeast Europe. Current Affairs and Strategic Perspectives.
The postscript of the book published by RAO is signed by Iulian Vlad, the last chief of the communist Security, arrested on December 31, 1989, and sentenced to 25 years in prison for his role in the repressions in Timișoara and Bucharest. He was granted amnesty in 1993 by President Ion Iliescu.
Gabriel Vlase has never denied, in his conversation with Emilia Șercan, that he plagiarized his Ph.D. thesis: "Indeed, with this plagiarism, if that's what the law says, that's how it is [...]. But, where there's a mistake, let it be a mistake. There was no bad intention. I tell you honestly," he said.