MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

FT tops list of world's best newspapers

The Financial Times topped a list of the world's best newspapers, according to a survey of executives, politicians, university lecturers, journalists and advertising professionals conducted by a Swiss-based consultant.

Among 1,000 respondents from 50 countries, 19.4 percent chose the FT as the best paper, according to the survey by Zurich-based Internationale Medienhilfe published on Tuesday.

The Wall Street Journal took second place with 17.0 percent, followed by Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in third with 16.2 percent.

The New York Times slipped from first place in the 2003 survey to sixth, its score dropping to 8.1 percent from 21.3 percent. "The results show that the New York Times is suffering because of past scandals, while German-language publications remain highly respected internationally," Internationale Medienhilfe said in a statement.

Asahi Shimbun of Japan and Italy's Corriere della Sera appeared in the top 10 for the first time, in eighth and 10th places, respectively.

Following are the results of the survey. Figures in brackets show 2003 survey results:

Position Publication, country Mentions (pct)

1 Financial Times (UK) 19.4 (20.7) 2 Wall Street Journal (US) 17.0 (7.5) 3 Frankfurter Allgemeine (Germany) 16.2 (10.9) 4 Le Monde (France) 12.5 (2.1) 5 Neue Zuercher Zeitung (Switzerland) 12.1 (15.0) 6 New York Times (US) 8.1 (21.3) 7 Intl. Herald Tribune (France) 5.2 (11.3) 8 Asahi Shimbun (Japan) 2.6 (0.4) 9 El País (Spain) 1.9 (4.8) 10 Corriere della Sera (Italy) 1.3 (0.7) Other papers 3.7 (3.8)