New Zealand was Wednesday named the world's least corrupt nation out of a list of 180 countries, unseating Denmark after a year in which the global recession and ongoing conflicts proved challenging. The annual index by Transparency International ranked 180 countries on a scale of zero to 10 according to 13 independent surveys, with zero being perceived as highly corrupt and 10 as having low levels of corruption. In second place was last year's leader, Denmark with 9.3 followed by Singapore and Sweden tying at 9.2 and Switzerland at 9.0. Countries at the bottom of the table were those which are unstable or impacted by war and ongoing conflicts that have affected the public sector and torn apart governance infrastructure. Somalia had a score of 1.1, Afghanistan was 1.3, Myanmar ranked 1.4 and Sudan tied with Iraq at 1.5. Rounding out the top 10 least corrupt nations were Finland, the Netherlands, Australia, Canada and Iceland. Britain came 17th in the list and the US was 19th with a score of 7.5.
