By Catherine Maddux,
SOUTH Sudan is now the world’s most fragile nation, displacing Somalia, which has held the top spot for the last six years.
The Fund for Peace, in partnership with the Foreign Policy Magazine have tracked South Sudan since 2012, not long after it became the African continent’s newest country.
But in the short time since its birth, it has suffered from chronic instability, said J.J. Messner, co-director of the yearly index and Director of Sustainable Development & Security at the Fund.
“The reason for South Sudan’s position has much to do with its increasingly fractious politics among the leadership,” Messner said. “And, perhaps even more importantly, the growing ethnic element to the violence [there].”
Somalia, which Messner said has made some progress toward creating a functioning government, is no longer number one, but only dropped one spot.
In fact, six of the index’s top 10 most fragile states are African countries, joined by Afghanistan, Yemen, Haiti and Pakistan.
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The List: Fragile States Index 2014
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