Azerbaijan Inferior to Its Neighbors in Passport Index

Baku / 08.01.19 / Turan: On January 8, 2019, Henley & Partners published an updated Passport Index, which reflects recent changes in the visa-free regime of countries around the world.

In the first quarter of 2019, Japan became the leader of the Index, whose citizens can visit 190 countries of the world without a visa. A year ago, Germany ranked first with an indicator of 177 countries. Now Germany shares the third place with France (188 countries with visa-free visits). In second place is South Korea, which for three months added India to the list of visa-free countries and climbed one position in the Index. Singapore is also in second place with 189 countries.

The UK and the US continue to lose ground in the Index, and are now in 6th place (185 countries). Experts explain a significant drop from the 1st place in 2015 with the policy of "closed doors" of both countries.

At the beginning of 2019, Azerbaijani citizens have visa-free access to 66 countries of the world, occupying only the 74th place in the Index. Last year, Azerbaijanis could visit 63 countries of the world without a visa.

Citizens of Russia, Turkey and Kazakhstan can visit 119, 111 and 76 countries, respectively, without visas. Georgia ranks 51st in the Index, because its citizens can visit 114 countries without a visa.

Moldova, which launched the Citizenship through Investments program in 2018, ranks 46th (122 countries without a visa).

Ukraine has 128 countries without a visa. -02D-