Transparency International released its 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index on Thursday, ranking levels of perceived corruption in governments across the world.

Georgia scored 56 out of 100 points. It means that Georgia is the top-scoring country in Eastern Europe and Central Asia region , among  19 countries.

Eastern Europe and Central Asia is the second-lowest performing region on the CPI, with an average score of 35. Only three countries score above the global average: Georgia (56), Belarus (45) and Montenegro (45). At the bottom of the region are Turkmenistan (19), Uzbekistan (25) and Tajikistan (25).

According to the report, undue influence over key institutions continues to present the utmost challenge to political integrity in Georgia, which dropped two points on the CPI since last year. Among 180 countries Georgia is on the 44th place.

The index ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption, according to experts and business people. It uses a scale of zero to 100, where zero is highly corrupt and 100 is very clean. More than two-thirds of countries score below 50 on this year’s CPI, with an average score of just 43.

The top countries are New Zealand and Denmark, with scores of 87 each, followed by Finland (86), Singapore (85), Sweden (85) and Switzerland (85).

The bottom countries are Somalia, South Sudan and Syria with scores of 9, 12 and 13, respectively. These countries are closely followed by Yemen (15), Venezuela (16), Sudan (16), Equatorial Guinea (16) and Afghanistan (16).