Myanmar came out as the third most corrupt country in the Asia Pacific region, according to a report released by the Berlin-based NGO Transparency International.
This ranking in Asia Pacific, with only Afghanistan and North Korea perceived as more corrupt, has gone unchanged since 2012.
Myanmar’s worldwide ranking, however, has improved significantly. In 2011, Myanmar tied with Afghanistan for 180th place out of 182 countries surveyed, but this year rose to 156th place out of 175 countries surveyed.
In the whole of Asia, central Asia and the Middle East included, Iraq, Syria, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Yemen also rank as more corrupt than Myanmar in this year’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) report.
On a scale of 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (completely clean), Myanmar scored a 21 this year, unchanged since last year, but up from a score of 15 in 2011 and 2012.
Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index is a gauge of public notions of the corruption of a country, as corruption is impossible to measure in real terms.
Myanmar also ranks in the bottom percentile of the World Bank’s control of corruption survey, measuring, “perceptions of the extent to which public power is exercised for private gain” on their Worldwide Governance Indicators.
