In Europe, the Baltic countries of Latvia and Lithuania had the highest and third highest homicide rates respectively in 2022. Latvia had the highest rate at over four per 100,000 inhabitants. Meanwhile, the lowest homicide rate was found in Liechtenstein, with zero murders The most dangerous country worldwide Saint Kitts and Nevis is the world's most dangerous country to live in in terms of murder rate. The Caribbean country had a homicide rate of 65 per 100,000 inhabitants. Nine of the 10 countries with the highest murder rates worldwide are located in Latin America and the Caribbean. Whereas Celaya in Mexico was listed as the city with the highest murder rate worldwide, Colima in Mexico was the city with the highest homicide rate in Latin America, so the numbers vary from source to source. Nevertheless, several Mexican cities rank among the deadliest in the world when it comes to intentional homicides. Violent conflicts worldwide Notably, these figures do not include deaths that resulted from war or a violent conflict. While there is a persistent number of conflicts worldwide, resulting casualties are not considered murders. Partially due to this reason, homicide rates in Latin America are higher than those in countries such as Ukraine or the DR Congo. A different definition of murder in these circumstances could change the rate significantly.
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The average for 2017 based on 24 countries was 1.4 homicides per 100,000 people. The highest value was in Lithuania: 4.5 homicides per 100,000 people and the lowest value was in Luxembourg: 0.3 homicides per 100,000 people. The indicator is available from 1990 to 2017. Below is a chart for all countries where data are available.
Turks and Caicos Islands saw a murder rate of ***** per 100,000 inhabitants, making it the most dangerous country for this kind of crime worldwide as of 2024. Interestingly, El Salvador, which long had the highest global homicide rates, has dropped out of the top 29 after a high number of gang members have been incarcerated. Meanwhile, Colima in Mexico was the most dangerous city for murders. Violent conflicts worldwide Notably, these figures do not include deaths that resulted from war or a violent conflict. While there is a persistent number of conflicts worldwide, resulting casualties are not considered murders. Partially due to this reason, homicide rates in Latin America are higher than those in Afghanistan or Syria. A different definition of murder in these circumstances could change the rate significantly in some countries. Causes of death Also, noteworthy is that murders are usually not random events. In the United States, the circumstances of murders are most commonly arguments, followed by narcotics incidents and robberies. Additionally, murders are not a leading cause of death. Heart diseases, strokes and cancer pose a greater threat to life than violent crime.
The four Nordic countries Sweden, Iceland, Norway, and Denmark are between the five countries with the highest rate of reported sexual violence in Europe in 2022. More than 200 cases per 100,000 inhabitants were reported in Sweden.Please note that reporting varies from country to country, and the willingness of victims to come forward can vary across regions and cultures, therefore a comparison between the countries should be taken with caution.
In Europe in 2019, England and Wales had the highest reported rate of serious assaults per 100,000 inhabitants, with almost 930 reported incidents. Belgium had the second highest rate with close to 560. Romania had the lowest rate of reported serious assaults, with only 1.46 per 100,000 inhabitant, followed by Lithuania and Albania. Despite this low rate of assault, Lithuania, Albania and Romania had some of the highest homicide rates in Europe, suggesting that there is a discrepancy in how often assaults are reported in these countries, or the methodology behind data collection.
The United States had, by far, the highest homicide rate of the G7 countries between 2000 and 2023. In 2023, it reached 5.76 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants, a decrease from 6.78 in 2021. By comparison, Canada, the G7 nation with the second-highest homicide rate, had 1.98 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants in 2023. Out of each G7 nation, Japan had the lowest rate with 0.23 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants.
The Balkan countries Montenegro and Albania have the highest murder rates with cases involving firearms in Europe. Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, Sweden came third. The Scandinavian country has seen increasing levels of gang-related violence in recent years.
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Study questionsTo describe the prevalence of physical, sexual, and psychological intimate partner violence (IPV) against women in the European Union (EU) and to search for their determinants among demographic, socioeconomic, health-related factors, and partner characteristics.MethodsObservational study. Data from the violence against women survey, the first study conducted in the EU, which simultaneously measured all dimensions of IPV and many characteristics. The EU Agency for Fundamental Rights randomly conducted face-to-face interviews among the 28 countries with 42,002 women aged 18–74 who resided in the survey country and spoke the language. IPV is defined by a positive answer to at least one question about physical, sexual, or psychological violence perpetrated by a current or ex-partner.FindingsAmong the 40,357 women having already been in a relationship, 51.7% (51.2–52.2) reported having been victims of violence in their lifetime. The prevalence of physical, sexual, and psychological IPV was, respectively, 20.0% (19.6–20.4), 8.4% (8.2–8.7), and 48.5% (48.1–49.0). Women, who were younger, employed, had highly qualified work, had at least one immigrant parent, lived in an urban setting, were unmarried, separated, divorced, widowed, childless, cohabited with a partner, and others over the age of 18, had worse self-perceived health, or a history of violence before the age of 15 were more likely to report IPV. It was the same when their partners had a lower level of education, no work, were home staying, earned less than they did, were involved in 10 years of relationship, were frequently drunk, or were violent otherwise.Major implicationThe lifetime prevalence of reported IPV among women in Europe is high and likely underestimated. The results emphasize the importance of a comprehensive definition of IPV and partners' characteristics. They highlight socioeconomic differences and poorer health status for victims of IPV.
This opinion poll was conducted at the request of the Secretariat-General of the European Commission. It was managed and organised it by the Public Opinion Analysis Unit of DG X ("Information, Communication, Culture and Audio-visual Media"). The data was collected from all Member States of the European Union between 12 March and 4 May 1999. INRA (EUROPE) - European Coordination Office, in Brussels, was responsible for general coordination. The report examines what Europeans think about issues relating to violence against children. It is divided into a number of sections which examine how much Europeans know about the matter, what sources of information they are aware of, who they think most likely to inflict this type of violence, what actually constitutes violence against children, how widespread they imagine it to be, what factors they think cause it, which organisations should help the children affected, what they know about the laws on a number of related issues, how useful they think various approaches are to combating domestic violence and whether the European Union has a part to play. #####The results by volumes are distributed as follows: * Volume A: Countries * Volume AA: Groups of countries * Volume A' (AP): Trends * Volume AA' (AAP): Trends of groups of countries * Volume B: EU/socio-demographics * Volume C: Country/socio-demographics ---- Researchers may also contact GESIS - Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences: http://www.gesis.org/en/home/
As of November 24, 2024 there were over 274 million confirmed cases of coronavirus (COVID-19) across the whole of Europe since the first confirmed cases in France in January 2020. France has been the worst affected country in Europe with 39,028,437 confirmed cases, followed by Germany with 38,437,756 cases. Italy and the UK have approximately 26.8 million and 25 million cases respectively. For further information about the coronavirus pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.
In 2022, an estimated *** femicides were reported across European countries. Femicide, which refers to the gender-related killing of women and girls, represents the most extreme cases of violence against women. In this year there were estimated to have been *** femicides in Italy, *** in France, *** in Germany and ** in Spain.
The European Union's member states have widely differing experiences when it comes to corruption and the rule of law. While some states such as Denmark and Finland show extremely low levels of corruption, others find the issue to be one of the key challenges facing their countries. For Malta, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria, and Hungary, the issue of domestic corruption is particularly severe, as they are ranked as the bottom five member states in Transparency International's corruption perceptions index in 2024. In these EU member states, officials in public administration or the justice system are more likely to be swayed by bribes and citizens' civil and political liberties are less likely to be respected. Croatia, Romania, and Bulgaria have seen a slight increase in their scores over the past decade, while for Hungary and Malta the situation with corruption has significantly deteriorated. Hungary in particular has seen its score fall from 51 in 2015 to only 41 in 2024, as the country's illiberal Prime Minister Viktor Orban has implemented reforms to the media, judiciary, and political system which have substantially worsened corruption.
Face-to-face interview Face-to-face interview: CAPI (Computer Assisted Personal Interview)
In 2025, Pietermaritzburg in South Africa ranked as the world's most dangerous city with a crime rate of 82 per 100,000 inhabitants. Five of the 10 cities with the highest crime rates worldwide are found in South Africa. The list does not include countries where war and conflict exist. South Africa dominates crime statistics When looking at crime rates, among the 10 most dangerous cities in the world, half of them are found in South Africa. The country is struggling with extremely high levels of inequality, and is struggling with high levels of crime and power outages, harming the country's economy and driving more people into unemployment and poverty. Crime in Latin America On the other hand, when looking at murder rates, Latin America dominates the list of the world's most dangerous countries. Violence in Latin America is caused in great part by drug trafficking, weapons trafficking, and gang wars.
In 2021, Liechtenstein had the highest female homicide rate in Europe, with an estimated **** women per 100,000 falling victims to intentional homicide. However, this number is skewed due to Liechtenstein's very small population; in real terms, this equates to one female homicide in Liechtenstein in 2021. For more populous countries, the next countries on the list are six of Eastern Europe's seven former-Soviet states, with Latvia and Russia having the highest rates of intentional female homicide in Europe (Estonia is the outlier).
In 2022, according to a response to the statement "cycling from one place to another in my area is too dangerous" in a survey, Italy was the country where cyclists felt most unsafe cycling from one place to another. ** percent of Italian respondents indicated that it was too dangerous to cycle in their neighborhood. Menawhile, the Netherlands had the lowest share of residents who felt endangered when cycling from one place to another, at a rate of ** percent. France, Spain, and Great Britain were among the countries with a larger share of residents who felt unsafe cycling in the city.
This statistic presents what people perceive to be the leading causes of murder in selected European Countries in 2018. According to data published by Ipsos, ** percent of British respondents think that most people in their country were killed by sharp objects such as knives.
In 2022, an estimated ***** femicides were reported in ******, making it the European country with the highest number of such crimes. Femicides, defined as the gender-based killing of women and girls, represent the most extreme form of violence against women. That same year, Turkey, and the United Kingdom ranked second and third, with *** and *** cases, respectively.
This statistic presents the share of people who think in selected European countries who think physical violence is one of the top three issues facing women as of 2019. According to data published by Ipsos, Spain had the highest share of people who thought that physical violence towards women was one of the most important issues at ** percent of respondents.
In 2019, France had the highest number of overall homicides in Europe at 835, with 285 of the victims being women. Germany had the second highest number of intentional homicides in that year, at 623 with 347 of those victims being male.
In Europe, the Baltic countries of Latvia and Lithuania had the highest and third highest homicide rates respectively in 2022. Latvia had the highest rate at over four per 100,000 inhabitants. Meanwhile, the lowest homicide rate was found in Liechtenstein, with zero murders The most dangerous country worldwide Saint Kitts and Nevis is the world's most dangerous country to live in in terms of murder rate. The Caribbean country had a homicide rate of 65 per 100,000 inhabitants. Nine of the 10 countries with the highest murder rates worldwide are located in Latin America and the Caribbean. Whereas Celaya in Mexico was listed as the city with the highest murder rate worldwide, Colima in Mexico was the city with the highest homicide rate in Latin America, so the numbers vary from source to source. Nevertheless, several Mexican cities rank among the deadliest in the world when it comes to intentional homicides. Violent conflicts worldwide Notably, these figures do not include deaths that resulted from war or a violent conflict. While there is a persistent number of conflicts worldwide, resulting casualties are not considered murders. Partially due to this reason, homicide rates in Latin America are higher than those in countries such as Ukraine or the DR Congo. A different definition of murder in these circumstances could change the rate significantly.