Nepal: a safe place to live among SAARC countries
Nepal is the safest place to live in South Asia after Bhutan, a fresh report revealed. According to the Global Peace Index (GPI) Report, the world’s leading measure of national peacefulness, Nepal has been gradually turning into a safer haven to live in as peace indicators in the once “civil war” Himalayan nation is on an improving trend.
The Australia-based Institute for Economics and Peace put Nepal in the 76th position with a GPI score of 1.99.
The 2014 report presents Bhutan (16th) as the most peaceful nation in the SAARC region.
After Nepal, Bangladesh has been ranked at 98th place while India is 143rd and Sri Lanka is 105th. Pakistan made it to the 154th position, indicating that it is the world’s ninth most unstable country.
Nepal is also a comparatively peaceful nation in the world than the USA (101st) and China (108th).
According to the report, Nepal scored 1.8 of 5 points at the level of militarization while 2.5 and 1.4 marks on society and security; and domestic and international conflict respectively.
The index has it that the national cost of violence in Nepal was USD 1,025,000,000. According to the report, the country gets a 36.2/a 100 score for press freedom.
Life expectancy in Nepal is 67.5 years, the report said adding that the country recorded infants at 33.6 per thousand live births.
Nepal has been included in GPI since 2009 which had been listed in 144 countries. GPI had ranked 149 countries in 2010 while 153,158, 158 respectively in 2011, 2012, and 2013 in its index.
Though peace indicators are on an improving trend in the Himalayan nation, the 2014 GPI portrays that the world has become more restless after 2008. Including Nepal 52 countries have improved in the level of peace while, 111 countries have deteriorated.