The Japanese passport overtakes Singapore to become the strongest in the world according to 2018 Henley Passport Index release. It allows Japanese passport holders to travel to 190 countries and territories freely without a visa. The Singapore passport allows its holders to travel to 189 destinations freely without a visa that is one less to Japanese visa. Japan earned this additional number after gaining visa-free access to Myanmar for its holders.
Germany, South Korea, and France fall at the third number in the list of strong passport countries having free-visa access to 188 countries. France and South Korea gained the position of third strongest passport country by gaining free-visa access to Uzbekistan and Myanmar respectively.
However, United Kingdom (UK) and United States (US) came down from fourth to the fifth position among the strong passport country’s list with 186 countries to enter freely without any visa. This development was a result of the countries failure to gain any more visa-free entry in their passport. Although, UK and US both were the two strongest passport countries in the year 2015.
Iraq and Afghanistan remained the countries with the weakest passport holding the visa-free access for 30 countries and territories. These two countries lie on the 106th position in the list of countries with passport strength category.
However, United Arab Emirates did a great job by improving its position and gaining 21st position in the list. Earlier UAE was at the 62nd position in the list in 2006. Now UAE has the most powerful passport among the Middle East countries.
Strangely, the two biggest countries in the world, Russia and China, remained in broadly similar positions. Russia, which fell from 46th to 47th place, had a short-term boost when in September Taiwan announced that it would offer a visa waiver programme for its nationals, valid until next July. China fell two places to 71, although its citizens gained entry to St Lucia and Myanmar without a prior visa.
