Bottom three still at the bottom

Afghanistan, North Korea, and Somalia are seen as the most corrupt nations in the world, according to Transparency International's latest survey. More than two thirds of the 177 countries included in the 2013 Corruption Perceptions Index scored below 50, where 0 indicates the country's public sector is seen as highly corrupt and 100 as very clean. Denmark and New Zealand performed best with scores of 91. Afghanistan, North Korea, and Somalia tied last with 8 points each. "All countries still face the threat of corruption at all levels of government, from the issuing of local permits to the enforcement of laws and regulations," said Huguette Labelle, Transparency International's Chair in a statement. In Syria, where 100,000 have died in a conflict which began in 2011 and has now exploded into war, people regard its public sector as increasingly corrupt. The stricken nation dropped 9 points from 144th place to 168th. Libya, Yemen, Spain, Australia, Guatemala, and Madagascar were among other countries whose scores declined significantly. Myanmar saw the biggest improvement, rising from 5th last position in 2012 to 19 places from the bottom this year. The change reflects the benefits of introducing more open and democratic rules after years of military rule, according to Transparency International's Asia Pacific Director, Srirak Plipat. Myanmar also ratified an international treaty against corruption in December 2012 and the parliament approved an anti-corruption law in July, although this is yet to come into force. While Greece's score rose four points this year to 40, but remained the lowest ranking country in the European Union in 80th place. Brunei, Laos, Senegal, Nepal, Estonia, Lesotho, and Latvia also improved. But more still needs to be done about that, just like more needs to be done when it comes to this: kids and their parents at a cinema in Florida who were expecting to see Disney's latest movie Frozen were accidentally treated to porn. Instead of the feisty princess of the PG-rated Disney feature, the audience saw two minutes of explicit scenes including oral sex. The projectionist apparently mixed up a fill-in cartoon with the red-band trailer for Lars Von Trier's upcoming film Nymphomaniac, featuring Shia LaBeouf having sex on screen. This mistake happened when the theatre was experiencing some technical difficulties that delayed the start of Frozen, so they temporarily played another cartoon. "They put in the filler, it looked like Steamboat Willie, the old Mickey Mouse cartoon, and then all of a sudden it goes into this other scene," Lynn Greene who was there with grandchildren said. Although the cinema said the clip played for less than two minutes, Greene said it seemed to last much longer. "It seemed like forever when you're trying to, you know, cover a little guy's eyes," she said. "I didn't have enough hands to cover his ears too and he got the sound down real good." Seriously, this is not what people should expect from their local cinema. But at least the theatre tried to do the decent thing, and offered free movie tickets to those in the audience. Maybe they can go back for some fun movies like The Loin King, The Privates in the Caribbean, or Moby's Dick.