Azerbaijan among world's most aggressive countries

The Global Peace Index is compiled by an independent Research Institute of Economy and Peace and the analytical department of the British The Economist magazine.

The experts assess each country by 24 criteria-relations with neighbors, number of soldiers displaced abroad, sale of weapon and others. Information about the number of prisoners, crime level and threat of terrorism inside the country are also taken into account.

A rating, which defines the peace-lovingness of any country, is compiled by results of the analysis. 140 countries have been considered. Their number has risen as compared to the previous year.

By results of the researches the most peace-loving country is Iceland. The top ten of the most peaceful countries included Denmark (2nd place), Norway (3rd place), New Zealand (4), Japan (5), Ireland (6), Portugal (7), Finland (8), Luxembourg (9) and Austria (10).

According to the research, the three half of the most peace-loving countries are European with majority joining the European Union. Iraq was recognized the most aggressive, where the violence is not stopping following the intervention of forces under the US leadership.

Among the post-Soviet countries the most peace-loving is Estonia, taking the 35th position. Its neighbors Latvia and Lithuania were 39th and 41st respectively. The second half of the rating included several countries of the former USSR. Kazakhstan took the 72nd place, Moldova 83rd, Ukraine 84th, Belarus 94th, Azerbaijan 101st, Turkmenistan 111th, Russia 131st.

Thus, the authors considered Azerbaijan less peace-loving than 8 countries of the post-Soviet area, which were included into the rating and only Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Russia are more aggressive than Baku.

Nevertheless, even the less peace-loving are the United States (97), Turkey (115), Israel (136). The last the Iraq (140).

Armenia was not included into the rating. The low position of the United States on the list-the country lags even behind Syria, Rwanda and Mongolia-reflects the high level of defense expenses and military activeness. Moreover, the share of prisoners in the United State is higher than in any other country, reads Financial Times.

/Echo/