Zelensky's Boosted by Ukraine's New Corruption Ranking

Ukraine's ranking in Transparency International's annual Corruption Perception Index (CPI) jumped 12 places in 2023, handing a boost to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as he pushes to root out corruption within his government and military.

The CPI ranks 180 countries and territories around the globe by their perceived levels of corruption, with the country in first place deemed the least corrupt, and the nation in 180th place considered the most corrupt. The CPI is the most widely used global corruption ranking in the world, and measures how corrupt each country's public sector is perceived to be, according to experts and business people.

Ukraine ranked 104th least corrupt country in 2023, up 12 places from 116th in 2022—the year Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale invasion of the country—according to the CPI.

Ukraine is eager to tackle corruption, in part to help its bid to become an EU member, and Zelensky vowed to tackle the issue when he came to power in 2019. Ukraine became a formal candidate for EU membership in 2022, shortly after the war began.

The country has consistently ranked in the bottom half of Transparency International's annual global CPI, but in the last decade, Ukraine has gone up 40 places—rising steadily from a ranking of 144th in 2013, to 104th last year.

Tackling corruption is a key demand from Brussels for Ukraine to join the 27-member EU bloc. Andrii Kostyn, Ukraine's top prosecutor told Politico in October that he was confident that "all the elements of the anti-corruption and law enforcement reforms [required by the EU] will be completed in coming months."

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on November 8 that Ukraine had "completed…well over 90 percent" of the recommended reforms on corruption.

"Ukraine has demonstrated a good result this year and progressive dynamics in 10 years," Andrii Borovyk, executive director of Transparency International Ukraine, was quoted by state-run news agency Interfax as saying on Tuesday.

"Now we have reached the indicators of the EU candidate countries… We have developed an anti-corruption ecosystem from scratch and already have real sentences for high-profile corruption, but we still need to work hard to catch up with the performance of the EU countries," Borovyk added.

Ukraine was able to boost its ranking in 2023 by focusing on reforms of its justice system, taking into account the restructuring of judicial self-government and increasing the independence of the judiciary, the news agency reported.

Zelensky's government aides and his military have been plagued with corruption scandals in recent months.

On January 9, Ukraine's defense minister, Rustem Umerov, said an audit had uncovered corruption connected to military procurement worth 10 billion hryvnia ($262 million) in the four months he had been in post. His predecessor, Oleksii Reznikov, resigned in September over scandals that threatened to sap domestic and international confidence in Kyiv, Newsweek previously reported.

And on Sunday, Ukraine's security service said five people in the defense ministry and at an arms supplier were being probed after an investigation uncovered corruption in a roughly $40 million arms purchase.

Newsweek has contacted Ukraine's Foreign Ministry for comment by email.

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