World’s most dangerous countries to visit revealed

Thailand, Turkey and the Philippines pose ‘medium risk’ to travellers, study claims

The world’s most dangerous countries to visit have been revealed in the annual Global Risk Assessment report.

Compiled by Global Guardian, a duty of care firm specialising in travel risk, the countries are marked on an interactive map showing risk ratings and geopolitical conflict zones of countries all over the globe.

The map highlights areas of geopolitical tension and evaluates the prospects of escalation and their possible impacts, classifying countries under “extreme”, “high”, “medium”, “moderate” and “low”.

It also flags some places as having a “geopolitical risk”, including cold, warm or hot conflicts.

The countries revealed to be “extreme risk” are: Ukraine, Pakistan, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Yemen, Afghanistan, the Central African Republic and Burkina Faso.

The report marks several popular holiday destinations including Thailand, India, Turkey and the Philippines as “medium risk” due to criminality and sporadic unrest.

Popular holiday destination Mexico is marked as “high risk” due to violence involving cartels, including in popular tourist areas.

Countries marked as “extreme risk” means they are actively engaged in conflict and have a high level of criminal activity and civil unrest.

This rating also indicates that state institutions in these countries are not able to “manage militant groups or large-scale disasters”.

In its analysis of Ukraine, the Global Guardian team states: “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has led to dramatic increases in energy costs amid already high global inflation.

“Russia’s hold on much of Europe’s natural gas supply directly threatens Europe’s energy security.

“Ukraine and Russia constitute a large portion of global food and metal exports, and further disruption of these supply chains will continue to detrimentally affect the food supply and European manufacturing.”

On the other end, the report identifies some countries as “low risk”, marking them as green on the interactive map.

Some of the safest and most secure countries to visit include Germany, Poland, Norway, the Republic of Ireland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Japan and Canada.

“Countries classified as low risk are considered highly stable. These countries maintain a strong rule of law and are capable of containing threats to safety and security,” says Global Guardian.

The report marks the United Kingdom as having a “moderate risk”, meaning it is considered “resilient”, and “capable of quickly and effectively managing most crises and threats to personal security”.

But it adds that “criminal activity, terrorism, and natural disasters can impact travel or in-country operations.”

In July, Iceland topped the Global Peace Index (GPI) list of the world’s safest countries to live and travel in.

The index ranks 163 of the world’s nations in terms of “peacefulness”, analysing data on their political stability, neighbouring country relations, number of refugees, nuclear weapons, internal and external conflicts, military expenditure, incarceration rates and “perceptions of criminality”, among other factors.

New Zealand, Ireland, Denmark and Austria all made the top five safest countries on the list.