Experts on countries of origin by surname

Dr. Noelle Sullivan is a medical and sociocultural anthropologist who has done ethnographic (fieldwork-based) research since 2005 on the history and present of Tanzania’s health care sector. She is one of few scholars with expertise on how Tanzania’s health sector has changed through time in the postcolonial period, and what these changes have meant for the health care workers, patients, and families in Tanzania who provide or rely on this care. Sullivan has expertise on the sector’s capacities for certain kinds of care (reproductive and child health, mental health, preventive services, surgical capacity, HIV/AIDS, pediatric care, cancer care, cardiology, LGBTQ+ care, etc.) and how this capacity affects quality of health care delivery for prospective patients. She can also provide information on gender- and sexuality-related issues in Tanzania, including LGBTQ+ issues, traditional gender roles, some ethnic groups’ specific practices related to gender (including marriage practices, female genital cutting, relationships between families of married couples, polygamy, child rearing, etc.)

Associate Professor, PhD in Modern History and Political Thought, Lecturer in University, Mentor, Dean Of college.

The Expert is an Advocate from Bangladesh, holding substantial fieldwork experience within the country. She earned her LLB (Hons) from the University of London and completed her LLM (Master of Law) with a specialization in Victimology and Restorative Justice at Dhaka University.

She has attended various training programs, including "Transitional Justice in Asia and Participatory Research Tools with Survivors" organized by the Centre for the Study of Genocide and Justice, and "Human Rights and Gender Relation Analysis" organized by Ain o Shalis Kendra. Her expertise lies in Bangladeshi society and culture, particularly in the realms of Bangladeshi politics, human rights (focusing on gender and sexuality), and the rights of religious minorities (Hindus, Christians, Atheists). `

The Expert has actively contributed to research, advisory, and consultancy projects in Bangladesh, concentrating on formal and informal justice systems, freedom of speech, political rights, anti-corruption measures, violence against women, and minority rights. She maintains a robust network of experts throughout Bangladesh for document verification and is available to provide oral testimony in any court or tribunal, if necessary, to support her expert opinions.

Her academic and professional qualifications include an undergraduate in Psychology (Academic year: 1997) and a postgraduate degree and training (Academic year: 1997-98 and 1999-2000) in Clinical Psychology; clinical work is diverse and covers assessment and therapy for adults and minority ethnic groups for various conditions. As a multilingual psychologist with multi-cultural experience, she can assess efficiently and provide culturally emotional sensitive service

Her employment history involves working as a psychologist:

She used to work with Nafas Drug Treatment Centre, Age Concern, Special People, Social Action for Health, The UK Centre for Counselling & Psychotherapy, London School of Psychology and Health, Flow Neuroscience and Centre for Psychological Health (She has prepared numerous well-referenced expert reports for UK institutions including the Family Court, Immigration Court, Home Office, Department for Work and Pensions, and Land Registry. Her work integrates factual findings with comprehensive assessments and evidence-based analysis. She has prepared over 150 expert psychological and country reports, guided by a strong commitment to ethical and professional standards.

Professional Memberships and Affiliations:

She is… Read more

Salih Tarhan has ten years of experience in criminal law, with a focus on European Court of Human Rights practices. He earned his LLM in U.S. Legal Studies from the University of Connecticut School of Law. He has worked on both affirmative and defensive asylum cases. Currently, he is involved in legal tech projects that automate the filling out of governmental forms and the authentication of documents.

Dr Omer Tekdemir is an expert on the Middle Eastern region and an analyst of its legal, social, political, and cultural dynamics, providing consultancy on economic and governmental affairs. He is an Associate Professor in Interdisciplinary Studies and Associate Head of School at the School of Law. He holds a PhD from the Institute for Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, School of Government and International Affairs, Durham University (2013), and an MA in Contemporary Political Theory and International Relations from the Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Westminster, London.

Dr Tekdemir is the Managing Editor of the open-access journal New Middle Eastern Studies and has previously held the role of convener of the British International Studies Association (BISA) working group on Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, and Asian Studies. His research interest lies in violence, terrorism, security, conflict resolution, peacebuilding, post-conflict societies, nationalism, identity, democratization, populism, migration, diaspora, stateless peoples, and transnational justice, with a particular focus on the Kurds and Middle East. He is the author of a book on the Kurds and has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals and edited volumes.

Yihenew Alemu Tesfaye holds a PhD in Applied Anthropology, specialization in Medical Anthropology, from Oregon State University, USA. Since 2019, Yihenew has been working as a visiting Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of Gondar (UoG) and Bahir Dar University (BDU), Ethiopia. From 2022 to 2024, Yihenew worked as Professor of Anthropology in the U.S. Ambassador’s Distinguished Scholars Program (ADSP) in Ethiopia based at BDU and Dire Dawa University (DDU). For the last fifteen years Yihenew has been engaged in several multidisciplinary research projects including bio-cultural and medical anthropology, public health, water satiation and hygiene (WASH), food and water insecurity, community health workers, and inter-communal conflicts in Ethiopia and Kenya. Yihenew co-authored well over twenty-five journal articles and two book chapters. Yihenew’s research interests include anthropology, public health, inter-communal conflicts, implementation science, social determinants of health, maternal and child health, food and water insecurity, community health workers, political economy, political ecology, sub-Saharan Africa (Ethiopia and Kenya) and the USA.   

I am a specialist in the history and anthropology of West Africa, especially related to conflict, gender-based violence, and traditional harmful practices. For the past 17 years I have lived and worked across West Africa, in particular Liberia and Ghana, as well as Benin, Burkina Faso, and Côte d'Ivoire. Since 2019 I have worked as the Director of an Oxfordshire-based research company, Résolu Ltd. Prior to this, I held positions as Assistant Professor in Gender Violence at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, Tutor in Gender, Geography & Environment at University of Oxford, and various other roles related to gender-based violence research in West Africa. My work has been published in Routledge, Third World Quarterly, and Democracy In Africa. I completed my DPhil at University of Oxford School of Geography and the Environment in 2016.

An accomplished Senior Analyst with 20 years of extensive experience spanning Latin America, Australia, the United States, and Europe, supported by interdisciplinary training in economics, political science, sociology, and international affairs. Currently Faculty Fellow at the Center for Cultural Sociology at Yale University after two years as Research Fellow at the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at the University of Minnesota and two years as Senior Policy Fellow at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University. Before returning to the US in 2019, I have been for a decade Associate Professor of Sociology at the National University of Colombia in Bogota and have directed for four years the Center for Social Studies at the same university. I have spearheaded technical cooperation initiatives focused on democracy-building and my work has involved community mobilization and outreach in Colombia, particularly on counter-radicalization and narrative transformation. I have engaged in collaboration with civil society, media, business sectors, policymakers, and academic institutions and have linked local efforts with regional and global initiatives, facilitating alliances at national, regional, and international levels. My role has also included… Read more

Allen L. Tran is an associate professor of anthropology at Bucknell University. His research examines the politics of mental and public health in Vietnam.

He has published in American Anthropologist, the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, and Medical Anthropology Quarterly, among others. His book, A Life of Worry: Politics, Mental Health, and Vietnam's Age of Anxiety (2023), is available through Open Access from the University of California Press.

Dr. Tran Thi Lan Anh (PhD in Law) has worked as a senior official for the Vietnamese Government. Expert holds PhD in Law from the School of Law, University of Leeds and worked as post-doctoral researcher on human rights here.

Dr. Tran Thi Lan Anh is also an expert on various aspect of Vietnam in include the socio-economic system, legal regime, human rights, political regime, women and children, and human trafficking. This expert has written many expert reports and made numerous appearances at the court as an expert witness.

Kathy Trang acquired her doctoral training in biological anthropology from Emory University and is an Associate Research Scientist at NYU and incoming Postdoctoral Fellow in the Dept. of Psychology at Yale University. Her research focuses on characterizing heterogeneity in post-traumatic stress and treatment outcome among high-risk populations in Vietnam, Jordan, and Bangladesh. 

Anthropologist and qualitative researcher with over a decade of experience conducting research with vulnerable populations. Specializing in participatory, ethical, and mixed methods research with lesbian, bisexual, and queer (LBQ+) women and LGBTIQA+ groups; human rights; SOGI inclusion; intersectional data analysis; sexual and gender-based violence; sexual and reproductive health and rights; NGOs and community-based organizations; HIV/AIDS programming; and inclusive and diverse programming in development and nonprofit interventions.

Noah Tucker is senior research consultant for the Oxus Society, an associate at the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Harvard and held the Handa Studentship at the Handa Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the University of St Andrews (Scotland) from 2021-2024.  He was previously Executive Editor for the Not in Our Name film and television series, the first region-wide project designed to prevent violent extremism in Central Asia through community dialogues in areas most directly affected by recruiting to Syria. Noah has worked as a consultant to programs supporting and evaluating programs for returnees from the Syrian conflict in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan for the US State Department and USIP. He has worked broadly on collaborative projects for government, academic and international organizations to identify the way social and religious groups affect political and security outcomes in Central Asia and Afghanistan. Recent publications include “Uzbek Women in the Syrian Conflict: First-Person Narratives and Gendered Perspectives on Mobilization and De-Mobilization.” Noah has worked on Central Asian issues since 2002—specializing in religion, national identity, ethnic conflict and social… Read more

The Expert is a Barrister-at-Law of England and Wales. The Expert is a practicing Advocate of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh. He holds the position of Head of Chambers at "LexAria and Jurists" (link : https://lexariaandjurists.com/) , and President at "Justice for All', with nearly a decade's experience in legal practice. The expert regularly moves before the Supreme Court of Bangladesh for various matters including Writ (Judicial Review), Criminal and Civil Appeal and Revision, Bail Petition, Intellectual Property, Company Matter, Inheritance, Public Interest Litigation, Muslim Personal Law, Succession Law, Hindu Law, etc.

As a practicing Advocate of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh, the expert is legally qualified to verify any legal documents including case, GD, judgments and other relevant documents, and check records from the government office of Bangladesh including Courts and Tribunals unless restricted by the law or relevant office. 

Parallel to his legal pursuits, the expert is the Legal Affairs and Political Editor of The Daily Campus and columnist. Accumulatively, he possesses over 18 years of sustained experience as a Journalist in Bangladesh, having written extensively on a broad range of issues, including human rights, the criminal justice… Read more

Dr. Emma Varley is an Associate Professor and Chair of Anthropology at Brandon University whose research spans over two decades in sociocultural and critical medical anthropology. Her work foregrounds the cultural, ethical, and political dimensions of medicine and public health, with particular expertise in maternal and neonatal health in contexts marked by conflict, weak governance, and structural violence. Her long-term ethnographic research focuses primarily on Pakistan and India, where she has examined how state policies, sectarian dynamics, and institutional practices shape obstetric care, health service delivery, and the lived experiences of women, families, and healthcare providers.

Dr. Varley’s scholarship integrates rigorous ethnographic methods with critical theory to explore power, exclusion, and embodiment in medical and humanitarian settings. Her publications address the impacts of political strife, natural disaster, health system mismanagement, and social marginalization on maternal health outcomes, advancing broader debates in global health, gender studies, conflict studies, and the anthropology of medicine.

Dr. Hanna Vasilevich is a researcher and academic currently based at the International Centre for Ethnic and Linguistic Diversity Studies in Prague, where she serves as Board Chair. Dr. Vasilevich has been a Visiting Research Fellow at Queen’s University Belfast, UK, and a Visiting Research Fellow at the Law & Anthropology Department of the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Halle/Saale, Germany. Before she worked at the European Centre for Minority Studies (Germany) and taught in a number of Universities in Czechia and Germany. 

Matthew Venker is a legal anthropologist studying race, citizenship, and migration in Burma (Myanmar) and among the Burmese diaspora. He uses historic, ethnographic, and visual studies methods to understand intersectional experiences of law and litigation. His current research focuses on the experience of irregular migrants leaving Burma in the wake of the nation's 2021 military coup. He has published on the racial and gendered legacies of colonial litigation, particularly among ethnic Chinese in Burma.

Matthew has fifteen years' experience working in East and Southeast Asia, including China, Thailand, and Myanmar. He has conducted research in Myanmar since 2017. He earned his Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2023.

Emmah Wabuke holds a PhD from University of Cambridge, a a Master of Laws (LL.M) from Harvard Law Schooland a Bachelor of Laws (LL.B) from the University of Nairobi. She is also an Advocate of the High Court of Kenya. She has experience conducting in-depth and impactful research works on varied human rights issues, including, women, peace and security, reproductive justice, criminal justice reform and sexual and gender-based violence.

Emmah also has extensive experience designing teaching curriculums on the impact of the law and politics on women’s lived experiences, and has conducted professional trainings on refugee protection, SGBV and human rights law in Kenya; and the laws governing Human Rights Defenders’ advocacy. She has previously worked as a law lecturer and was the Founding Director of Strathmore Law Clinic, based at Strathmore Law School, Nairobi, from 2018 to 2020. She has also worked as a summer lecturer at Pembroke College, University of Cambridge on Politics of Conflict and Peace.

I am a retired District & Sessions Judge with over twenty years of judicial experience within the High Court of Sindh and Special Courts in Pakistan, including Anti-Terrorism and Anti-Corruption jurisdictions. I hold a Ph.D. in Immigration Laws from the University of Karachi and have presided over complex cases involving emigration law, passport offences, foreign exchange violations, anti-money laundering, corruption, and criminal proceedings under the Pakistan Penal Code.

I provide independent expert country evidence on Pakistan in immigration, asylum and human rights appeals. My expertise includes the structure and functioning of the Pakistani criminal justice system, emigration enforcement, passport and identity documentation systems (including NADRA), anti-corruption mechanisms, prison conditions, procedural safeguards, and the treatment of individuals accused of criminal, political or financial offences. My judicial background enables me to produce objective, legally grounded and Tribunal-compliant reports that focus on plausibility, institutional practice and risk assessment, in accordance with expert witness duties.