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Only two EU countries are more corrupt than Italy

Italy has placed 60th in this year’s Corruption Perception Index (CPI), released by anti-corruption campaign group Transparency International on Wednesday.

Published: 25 January 2017 11:41 CET
Only two EU countries are more corrupt than Italy
Rome mayor Virginia Raggi, who was called in for questioning as part of a corruption this week, at the City Hall. Photo: Filippo Monteforte/AFP

The good news is that this was actually an improvement from last year's study, which placed Italy 61st – a climb of eight places from the year before. This made it one of the minority of countries which gained rather than lost points in the report's latest edition.

But it remains the third most corrupt country in the European Union, outdone by only Greece (69th place) and Bulgaria (75th).

Italy shared 60th place with Cuba, with both countries scoring 47 on the 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean) scale. Since the ranking began, Italy's highest ranking was 41st in 2007, but it dropped as low as 72nd in 2012.

Denmark and New Zealand shared first place, scoring 90 apiece and closely followed by Finland and Sweden, which scored 89 and 88 respectively. 

But what does Italy's poor score mean for the country?

Corruption is “closely connected” with inequality, leading both to become “system”, the campaigners wrote.

They also noted that this combination leads to public dissatisfaction with political institutions, and tends to feed populism. 

Populism is certainly on the rise in Italy, with the 'anti-establishment' Five Star Movement party, founded by comedian Beppe Grillo, consistently scoring well in the polls. The party won important victories in 2016's mayoral elections, with their candidate Virginia Raggi becoming Rome's mayor after previous holders of the office had become embroiled in corruption scandals.

However, the Five Star Movement itself has recently been implicated in corruption probes, with one of Raggi's closest aides arrested and the mayor called in for questioning this week over one of her appointments. In December, the party leadership stripped her of the power to make “important decisions” independently.

 

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As a whole, Transparency International said that no nation in the world is doing enough to fight corruption.

“There are no drastic changes in Europe and Central Asia in the Corruption Perceptions Index 2016, with only a few exceptions.

“However, this does not mean that the region is immune from corruption. The stagnation does not indicate that the fight against corruption has improved, but quite the opposite,” Transparency International wrote.

For the tenth year in a row, Somalia was at the very bottom of the 176 CPI, with a score of 10.The full ranking can be seen below.
 
 

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MIGRANT CRISIS

Charity warns Italy’s ban on migrant rescue planes risks lives

A migrant rescue charity warned on Thursday that a new Italian ban on using surveillance planes to spot migrant boats in distress in the Mediterranean could endanger lives.

Published: 9 May 2024 15:14 CEST
Charity warns Italy's ban on migrant rescue planes risks lives

Italy’s civil aviation authority Enac issued orders in the past week saying charities will have their planes seized if they carry out “search and rescue” activities from airports in Sicily.

The move follows restrictions placed by far-right premier Giorgia Meloni’s government on charity rescue ships as it attempts to fulfil its election pledges to curb arrivals, which soared to around 158,000 last year.

Nearly 2,500 people are known to have died in 2023 trying to cross the central Mediterranean, a 75 percent increase on the previous year, according to the UN’s International Organization for Migration (IOM).

READ ALSO: What’s behind Italy’s soaring number of migrant arrivals?

“This is definitely another attempt to criminalise search and rescue,” Giulia Messmer, spokesperson for the German charity Sea Watch, told AFP.

Sea Watch has two planes, the Seabird 1 and 2, but if they “are not able to fly anymore”, the planes “cannot communicate spotted distress cases” to authorities and ships able to carry out rescues, she said.

Enac says it is up to the coastguard, not charities, to perform search and rescue operations. The ban applies to the airports of Palermo and Trapani in Sicily, as well as the islands of Lampedusa and Pantelleria.

IN NUMBERS: Five graphs to understand migration to Italy

The IOM told AFP that while it was “waiting to understand its actual implementation, we are concerned that this decision may hinder life-saving efforts”.

Sea Watch warned the planes do not only play a vital role in spotting boats at risk of sinking, they also document the behaviour of the Libyan coastguard, often accused of violence towards migrants.

‘Political propaganda’

Immigration lawyer Fulvio Vassallo Paleologo told AFP the order issued by Enac was based on “a partial and contradictory reconstruction of national and international laws governing search and rescues”.

It was a political move, “a warning, during the election campaign” for the European Elections, he said.

Sea Watch on Twitter also called the move “an act of cowardice and cynicism… for political propaganda”.

Enac answers to Transport Minister Matteo Salvini, head of the anti-immigrant League party.

READ ALSO: ‘More will drown’: Italy accused of breaking international law on migrant rescues

Messmer, 28, said the Seabird 2 flew on Wednesday from Lampedusa despite the ban and the charity “plans to continue flying in the coming days”.

There were no issues getting the necessary authorisation from the airport to take off and land, she said.

Meloni, leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy party, was elected to office in 2022 promising to stop migrant boats arriving from North Africa.

Her government has brought in a law obliging charity ships to stage only one rescue at a time and they are often assigned ports in Italy’s distant north, making missions longer and more expensive.

Rome has also signed a controversial deal with Albania by which migrants from countries considered to be safe will be intercepted at sea and taken straight to Italian-run centres in Albania.

Critics say the deal is expensive and will prove ineffective because the two centres will only be able to hold a maximum of 3,000 people at a time and asylum applications are notorious slow.

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