Mexico tops world's most dangerous country list

New York: It’s official! Mexico is the most dangerous country in the world — with five of its cities named in a top 10 of deadly global murder capitals. The dubious honour of most violent urban area in the world, however, went to the Honduran metropolis of San Pedro Sula — where 1,143 of its 719,447 citizens were killed in just 12 months. That works out to 159 people per 100,000 citizens — higher than Ciudad Juarez, which led the list for three consecutive years, and dropped to second at a “only” 148 per 100,000, the ‘New York Daily News’ reported. [caption id=“attachment_487716” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Mexico is the most dangerous country in the world. [/caption] Forty of the 50 most dangerous cities are in Latin America, including 14 in Brazil and a dozen in Mexico. Two Mexican cities — Monterrey and Veracruz — made the list for the first time in 2011, while Tijuana, Reynosa and Matamoros dropped out of the top 50. Ciudad Juarez, Acapulco, Chihuahua, Durango and Torreon also featured high on the list of cities with the worst murder rates, according to a recently released report, based on 2011 statistics, by the Citizen Council for Public Safety and Criminal Justice. The most violent city in the US, New Orleans, came in 21st on the list with 199 murders out of a population of 343,829 — or a rate of 57.88 per 100,000. The list of most violent cities for 2011 was topped by San Pedro, Sula Honduras, followed by Juarez, Mexico at 2nd spot and Maceio, Brazil at 3rd place. Acapulco, Mexico and Distrito Central, Honduras stood at 4th and 5th place respectively . Other cities in the top ten are Caracas, Venezuela (6th), Torreon, Mexico (7th), Chihuahua, Mexico (8th), Durango, Mexico (9th) and Belem, Brazil at 10th. PTI