http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8363599.stm

Corruption can take money away from hospitals in places like Iraq, says TI

War-torn nations remain the world's most corrupt, Transparency International (TI) has said.

Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia are the lowest-ranked countries in TI's annual global survey. They were all at the bottom of the list last year as well.

"When essential institutions are weak or non-existent, corruption spirals out of control," TI said.

New Zealand was the least corrupt, with last year's winner Denmark as runner-up and Singapore third.

--> Worldwide Corruption 2005 - 2009 2005 - Countries are rated on a scale of 0 to 10, where 0 indicates a highly corrupt country and 10 would show a very low level of corruption. 2006 - Transparency International has been publishing corruption rankings since 1995. The number of countries included has risen from 41 to 180. 2007 - The darker colour a country is, the greater the amount of perceived corruption. Europe, North America and Oceania are the least corrupt. 2008 - The UK darkened slightly in 2008, largely as a result of the investigation into BAE Systems' activities in Saudi Arabia. 2009 - Transparency International uses estimates of the size and frequency of bribes as well as survey evidence and expert assessments. BACK 5 of 5 NEXT   It said this was a result of "political stability, long established conflict of interest regulations and solid, functioning public institutions". The issue of corruption in Afghanistan is particularly pressing. Widespread fraud marred the country's last elections, while the US is still debating whether to increase troop levels. The UK ranked 17th, down one place from last year. The US also fell one place to 19th. The organisation said tackling public sector corruption was even more pressing now, as governments worldwide had spent huge amounts of public money bailing out banks and public institutions. "At a time when massive stimulus packages, fast-track disbursements of public funds and attempts to secure peace are being implemented around the world, it is essential to identify where corruption blocks good governance and accountability," TI said. TI also welcomed action by the OECD and G20 group of richest nations to tackle tax havens and other places where corrupt government officials often harbour their money. "Corrupt money must not find a safe haven," it said. "The OECD's work in this area is welcome, but there must be more bilateral treaties on information exchange to fully end the secrecy regime." http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi/2009/cpi_2009_table

The Uk only fell one place this year? Despite the massive misuse of taxpayers money on personal items by MPs?

I'm amazed Italy isn't a shade or two higher. You hear all kinds of horror stories about Berlusconi and the Italian government being extremely corrupt. Maybe it's just corrupt by European standards.

Denmark ranks second, because we're awesome like that

The turnover rate is probably too high for much corruption to take hold. Seriously; the entire government seems to collapse at about a rate of once per year, at least for the last couple of decades.

I'm actually impressed by the United States ranking. I'd have thought that the roll of lobbyists and runaway private campaign funding would have hit it harder. Congrats U.S., you've left me pleasantly surprised.

And Canada - 8th. Good on us.

South Korea - 39th. Shitty.

I just looked at the rankings, it is sitting below Cuba and Turkey so it must be fairly corrupt anyway. However, looking at the methodology it is the perceived level of corruption in the public sector that is measured based on 13 surveys. I think it is an opinion poll that really doesn't accurately represent the true rates of corruption in that case. A lot of corruption in the public sector is hidden from public knowledge.

I mean Zimbabwe is 146th out 180; I know that's low, but it should be a lot lower.

Ranking asside. It's good to see improvement in the newer EU states. Poland and such alike (I think anyway look at the diagram).

We're actually so corrupt that we bribed Transparency International for that ranking.

the dark bits are the most corrupt, right?