Afghanistan and Corruption Index

Transparency International has released its 2014 yearly corruption index. In 2013 Afghanistan was ranked as the third most corrupt nation in the world - behind North Korea and Somalia. This year (2014) we see a significant improvement! Afghanistan is less corrupt in 2014 than in 2013. In 2014 Afghanistan is ranked as only the fourth most corrupt nation in the world. Yes, it's true. Somehow, despite Karzai's best efforts the country of Sudan moved into 3rd place. Now the only countries more corrupt than Afghanistan are Somalia, Korea, and Sudan (in that order). So ISAF's efforts at meaningful oversight of the billions of dollars spent in Afghanistan is bearing fruit. Well done, ISAF.

But, let's give NATO (and the U.S.) another chance at this. According to the NATO webpage that describes the key functions of the new Resolute Support mission addressing corruption is very important. The key functions for NATO in RSM are found below:

- Supporting planning, programming and budgeting;
- Assuring transparency, accountability and oversight;
- Supporting the adherence to the principles of rule of law and good governance;
- Supporting the establishment and sustainment of such processes as force generation, recruiting, training, managing and development of personnel.

With this much attention on the problem of corruption one would think that Afghanistan's ranking in December 2015 will be much improved. Time will tell. See the world wide corruption rankings at the link below:

www.transparency.org/cpi2014/results