The favourite migration destination of Indian citizens—Australia and Canada—also saw improvement in the power of their passports
The global citizenship and residence advisory company Henley & Partners ranked Indian passports at the 80th place, reported The Tribune. The strength of the Indian passport moved up from 87th place to 80th, giving its holders visa-free access to 57 countries, as per the report by Henley and Partners.
Interestingly, the favourite migration destination of Indian citizens—Australia and Canada—also saw improvement in the power of their passports. While Australia overtook Canada to land the sixth spot on the list, Canada too moved up from the last ranking to the seventh spot with access to 185 destinations visa-free.
The “world’s most powerful country”— the USA — slipped to the eighth spot.
Around 10 years back the UK and the US were the joint holders of the top spot on the index.
Notably, the latest edition saw the passports of many countries become more “powerful”, which many saw as an indication of improvement in the “soft power” and the “current geo-political situation” in the world.
Australia now holds the sixth place in the passport power list with access to 186 countries. According to reports, the improvement in the Australian passport is due to the increase in visa-free access to 186 destinations from 185 destinations earlier. While it lost visa-free access to Ethiopia, Papua New Guinea and Uganda, it gained on Japan, Mongolia, Suriname and Djibouti, they state, calling this as Australia’s “highest ranking since 2015”.
Though the number of destinations for people having the Canadian passport did not change, the document improved ranking to emerge seventh in the list, higher than neighbouring USA, counted among the world’s top five “superpowers”.
Though Canada’s passport was judged as “stagnant” due to this very reason, experts said other countries are getting stronger. In 2022, Canada was tied for the eighth spot with the Czech Republic, Greece, Malta and Australia, most of which improved ranking.
While Australia has the sixth place in the list, Malta and the Czech Republic are placed fifth with 187 countries. Greece is on the seventh spot with Canada.
10 Most Powerful Passports:
- Singapore is the most powerful passport with as many as 192 of 227 countries giving it visa-free access.
- On the second spot are Germany, Italy, and Spain with visa-free access to 190 destinations
- Japan, Austria, Finland, France, Luxembourg, South Korea, and Sweden are placed third with access to189 destinations without a prior visa.
- Denmark, Ireland, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom are at number four with access to 188 countries.
- At number five are Belgium, Czech Republic, Malta, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal and Switzerland with access to 187 countries.
- Australia, Hungary and Poland are placed sixth with holders having access to 186 countries.
- The most powerful country in the World—the USA—ranks eight along with Lithuania with visa-free access to 184 countries.
- At number nine are Latvia, Slovakia and Slovenia with access to 183 countries followed by Estonia and Iceland at the tenth spot and access to 182 countries.
- The completely open countries offering visa-free or visa-on-arrival entry to all 198 passports in the world (not counting their own) include Burundi, Comoro Islands, Djibouti, Guinea-Bissau, Maldives, Micronesia, Mozambique, Rwanda, Samoa, Seychelles, Timor-Leste, and Tuvalu.
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