Despite depicting tumult across continents, the 2017 Global Peace Index said the world had overall become more peaceful in the past year when measured against a range of indicators.
"Although this year's uptick is reassuring, the world is still mired with conflict in the Middle East, political turmoil in the U.S., refugee flows and terrorism in Europe," said Steve Killelea, founder of the Sydney-based Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), which produces the index.
Three out of the five least peaceful countries - Syria, Iraq and Yemen - are in the Middle East, and Syria retained the top spot of least peaceful country for the fifth year in a row.
It measures 23 indicators including incidents of violent crime, levels of militarisation, weapons imports, as well as refugee tallies and the number killed in internal conflict.