The 28 most dangerous countries in the world

The Institute for Economics and Peace this week published the Global Peace Index 2018, which ranks major nations around the world by how safe, or unsafe, they are.

The report ranked 163 countries based on how peaceful they are. The ranking is determined by 23 factors, which include murder rate, political terror, and deaths from internal conflict.

While the safest countries tend to be highly developed nations in the west and in eastern Asia, the most dangerous places are concentrated in Africa and the Middle East - where poverty and war create a highly unstable mix.

Syria, a country plagued by a brutal seven-year-long civil war ranks as the most dangerous country on the planet, closely followed by other war ravaged nations like Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Peace Index ranks countries from high to low, so the higher the number, the less safe the country. Check out the list of the world's most dangerous countries below.