Armenia ranks 129th in Transparency International corruption index

PanARMENIAN.Net - Transparency International warned that protests around the world, often fuelled by corruption and economic instability, clearly show citizens feel their leaders and public institutions are neither transparent nor accountable enough.

The 2011 Corruption Perceptions Index released in December 1 scores 183 countries and territories from 0 (highly corrupt) to 10 (very clean) based on perceived levels of public sector corruption. It uses data from 17 surveys that look at factors such as enforcement of anti-corruption laws, access to information and conflicts of interest, MercoPress says.

Armenia is ranked 129th scoring 2.6. Azerbaijan and Russia rank 143rd scoring 2.4. Georgia is less corrupted, ranking 64th (4.1). Turkey is 61st scoring 4.2

New Zealand ranks 1st, followed by Finland and Denmark. Somalia and North Korea (included in the index for the first time), are last.

Most Arab Spring countries rank in the lower half of the index, scoring below 4. Before the Arab Spring, a Transparency International report on the region warned that nepotism, bribery and patronage were so deeply engrained in daily life that even existing anti-corruption laws had little impact.

Euro-zone countries suffering debt crises, partly because of public authorities’ failure to tackle the bribery and tax evasion that are key drivers of debt crisis, are among the lowest-scoring EU countries.