The latest edition of the Global Peace Index has found that global peacefulness has improved for the first time in five years but that the world remains less peaceful than a decade ago.

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Published by the Institute for Economics and Peace, a non-profit think tank, Statista's Niall McCarthy notes that the research revealed that 76 countries saw their score decline while 86 recorded improvement.

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The index measures peace across a five-point scale through three filters. These are safety and security in society, ongoing domestic or international conflict as well as the degree of militarization in different countries.

This year Iceland topped the ranking, a position it's held since 2008. New Zealand comes second while Portugal rounds off the top three.

Afghanistan has now replaced, Syria at at the bottom of the index, followed by South Sudan and Yemen.

And perhaps most shocking is that the United States only comes 128th out of the 163 countries in the ranking.