Although corruption is still rife globally, more countries improved their scores in the 2015 edition of the corruption index, a Transparency Internation statement said on Wednesday.
Overall, two-thirds of the 168 countries on the 2015 index scored below 50 points on a scale from 0 (perceived to be highly corrupt) to 100 (perceived to be very clean).
"The 2015 corruption perceptions index clearly shows that corruption remains a blight around the world. But 2015 was also a year when people again took to the streets to protest corruption," Jose Ugaz, chair of Transparency International, was quoted as saying.
"People across the globe sent a strong signal to those in power: it is time to tackle grand corruption," Ugaz said.
Denmark took the top spot scoring 91 points, while North Korea and Somalia were the worst performers, scoring just eight points each.
Top performers share key characteristics including high levels of press freedom, access to budget information, high levels of integrity among people in power, and judiciaries that don't differentiate between rich and poor.
Brazil was the biggest decliner in the index, falling five points and dropping seven positions to a rank of 76.
The big decliners in the past four years include Libya, Australia, Brazil, Spain and Turkey. The big improvers include Greece, Senegal and Britain.
The corruption perceptions index is based on expert opinions of public sector corruption.
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