Corruption prevalent in Asia-Pacific region, Transparency says

Corruption remains a serious challenge in the Asia Pacific region, global watchdog Transparency International said in releasing its annual corruption perceptions index Wednesday. New Zealand was the "cleanest" of the 32 countries on the list for Asia and Pacific, while troubled Myanmar was at the bottom, according the survey released simultaneously in Berlin and London. The 2007 report lists 180 nations on a scale from zero (highly corrupt) to 10 (highly clean) based on a composite index from surveys compiled by experts and business sources over the past two years. Out of the 32 countries ranked from the Asia-Pacific region, 22 registered scores below 5, indicating that most of the countries in the region faced serious perceived levels of domestic corruption, the index showed. Among the countries with a significant worsening of scores are Bhutan, Laos and Macau. "The increase in the perceived levels of corruption in these countries highlights the need for governments to engage more actively with civil society in fighting corruption," Transparency said. Papua New Guinea and Thailand also saw an increase in the perceived levels of domestic corruption, it added, blaming poverty as one of the main reasons for bribery and graft. Thailand slipped back from 11th place to 14th in the Asia-Pacific index and from 63rd to 84th in the overall 180-nation world index. Papua New Guinea slumped from 20th to 26th and from 130th to 162nd on the global list. Indonesia, which shared the same placings with Papua New Guinea last year, dropped to 25th on the regional index and to 143rd overall. The Philippines slumped from 18th to 20th on the regional list and from 121st to 131st overall. Singapore followed New Zealand as the cleanest country on the Asia-Pacific list and moved up one spot from 5th to 4th on the overall index. India remained in 12th place on the regional list and shared 72nd spot with China overall. dpa ms bve