New Zealand is region's cleanest on corruption list

Only Finland and Denmark have cleaner public officials than New Zealand, a study shows

By CNN's Alex Frew McMillan

HONG KONG, China -- New Zealand has the cleanest government in the Asia-Pacific region, according to a recent survey.

But not all of the region's countries are so squeaky clean.

Bangladesh finished as the most-corrupt country in the world in Transparency International's latest corruption ranking.

Indonesia didn't do much better, landing third from bottom on the scale, which the Berlin-based group released late last month.

Bangladesh isn't happy about its 91st-place finish. The Bangladeshi government opted on July 3 to sue Transparency International for what it calls a "fabricated and unfounded" report.

"The government strongly believes that the report was not formulated on the basis of facts," a spokesman said at the time.

A measure of abuse

To be fair, Transparency International pointed out that Bangladesh's bottom-place finish "needs to be viewed with caution," because the data used to compile it was limited.

Transparency International creates its ranking, which scores countries from a high of 10 to a low of 0, by tallying surveys that measure how badly public officials abuse power.

The idea is to give the perceived risk of corruption, both for locals and visitors.

Finland and Denmark are the least corrupt countries, scoring 9.9 and 9.5 respectively. New Zealand followed at 9.4.

The group requires at least three surveys before it includes a country. New data meant Bangladesh appeared for the first time, with a very low score of 0.4.

But many of the more than 200 countries in the world didn't qualify, meaning there may be countries that would have fared worse.

Singapore at No. 4

Nigeria held the dubious distinction of "most corrupt" country in last year's rankings, and hasn't improved much. It finished second from the bottom in the 2001 tally, at 1.0.

There were several other noteworthy finishes in Asia. Singapore is the fourth-cleanest country in the world, with a score of 9.2, in a tie with Iceland.

Australia came in at No. 11 with a score of 8.5. Hong Kong finished 14, scoring 7.9.

In Asia, only Japan, No. 21 with a score of 7.1, and Malaysia, at No. 36 with 5.0, scored above the half-way mark.

Pakistan, Vietnam, India trail

Transparency International believes governments worldwide have a lot of work left to do. Almost two-thirds of the countries ranked scored less than 5 out of 10.

Besides Bangladesh and Indonesia, there were poor finishes for Pakistan, No. 79 with a score of 2.3, Vietnam, No. 75 with 2.6, and India, No. 71 with 2.7. The Philippines and Thailand didn't fare much better.

"There is a worldwide corruption crisis," Peter Eigen, Transparency International's chairman, said in a release. "There is no end in sight to the misuse of power by those in public office."