Corruption in new EU states
A new study by a global graft watchdog reveals that corruption in most of the countries that joined the European Union in 2004 is still high. Poland had the worst score, while Estonia had the best score of the former communist nations. The extreme right-wing government in Poland has promised to fight corruption and set up an agency with broad powers. Poland’s position on the list improved 9 places but is still well behind other new EU states. Corruption in Poland is also worse than future EU country Bulgaria. Bulgaria and Romania are set to join the EU in 2007 - many in Europe fear the corruption and violence in those countries. Finland is the least corrupt nation in the World.
Corruption remains widespread in the former communist nations which joined the European Union two years ago, despite efforts to fight the failings of the past, a global graft watchdog said on Monday.
In its annual worldwide survey of corruption, Transparency International (TI) noted that the 25-nation EU is home not only to some of the world’s least corrupt nations, such as Finland, Sweden and Denmark, but also to a handful of countries, notably Poland, who still have their work cut out.
TI ranked 163 countries according to the degree of corruption seen by business people and country analysts, with the scorecard ranging from zero, which is highly corrupt, and 10, which is squeaky clean.
Top-ranked Finland had 9.6 points while Haiti, classed as the most corrupt, had 1.8 points.
Of the eight former communist countries which joined the EU in May 2004, only Estonia (24th, 6.7 points) and Slovenia (28th, 6.4 points) scored convincingly on the TI list.CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ARTICLE AT EUBusiness.
Administrator @ November 7, 2006