Russia is working on creating its own ratings of prestigious universities after not a single Russian university has made it to the Times Higher Education list of the world`s top universities again. ­Russia`s Minister of Education Andrey Fursenko suggested checking the criteria on which the British ratings are based. "In some ways, any ratings assessment is a tool for a competitive battle. Willingly or unwillingly, it`s a tool of influence," Fursenko told the Interfax news agency. Fursenko was upset by the results of the latest ratings unveiled by the UK`s leading higher education news publication, The Times Higher Education Supplement. The researchers - over 17,000 academics from over 140 countries - didn`t mention Russia`s higher institutions on its list of the cream of the crop of universities around the globe. Harvard has topped the list of world`s best universities for the second year, according to The Times ratings followed mostly by other British and American universities. The only exception in the top 20 is the University of Tokyo, which to the surprise of many, ranked eighth. Russia`s landmark university, The Lomonosov Moscow State University, came in somewhere between 276 and 300 - last year, it was 33rd. St. Petersburg State University scored 351st - last year, it was 60th. Universities were ranked by reputation. The larger rankings included 400 world universities using 13 separate performance indicators - among them teaching, research, citations, industry income, and international outlook