South Sudan 'most fragile state' in world
Conflict in Sudan has ended the post-independence euphoriaLink to web article here.
The world's newest country, South Sudan, has topped the list of fragile states in this year's index released by a leading US-based research institute.
The top six countries on the index are all in sub-Saharan Africa.
Afghanistan was listed as the seventh most fragile state followed by Yemen, Haiti and Pakistan. Syria is 15th.
The institute has been compiling the index for the past 10 years after analysing social, economic and political indicators.
The "most improved" nations in 2014 were Iran, Serbia, Zimbabwe and Cuba, which have all had frosty relations with the US, it said on its website.
In contrast, the US and France were among countries where the situation had worsened the most because of "political and economic malaise".
South Sudan replaced Somalia at the top of the index - a position it had occupied since 2008.
Fighting erupted in the South Sudan capital, Juba, in mid-December. It followed a political power struggle between President Salva Kiir and his ex-deputy Riek Machar. The squabble has taken on an ethnic dimension as politicians' political bases are often ethnic.It became independent in 2011 after seceding from Sudan.
Although South Sudan took first place on the index, the security situation had worsened the most in the Central African Republic (CAR) in 2014, the institute said.
It was "beset by civil war, widespread atrocities, and the deployment of a French-led peacekeeping force", the group said.
Somalia had been knocked off the top of the index because it appeared to be on a "slow trajectory of improvement, so there is cause for some hope", the institute said.
However, the country was still affected by "widespread lawlessness, ineffective government, terrorism, insurgency, crime, and abysmal development", it added.