Experts on countries of origin by country

Karen O’Reilly is a country expert who has produced over 300 reports for asylum, criminal, deportation, high profile and country guidance cases in the UK, US, and Canada. Her expertise derives in large part from her extensive experience as a Refugee Resettlement Expert and Protection Officer for UNHCR, beginning in 2006. She is also a writer who has published extensively on refugee-related issues. 

Dr Paszkiewicz is an anthropologist with over 20 years of experience in Refugee Studies, with a geographical focus on the Horn of Africa and Eritrean forced migration in particular. 

As a prison conditions and detention expert, Vicki Prais has comprehensive, expert level legal and practical knowledge of international and regional human rights standards on criminal justice and detention. Vicki has in-country experience working in different settings, including Kosovo, Armenia, Albania, Ukraine, Ethiopia, Japan, Georgia, Thailand, Bangladesh, Canada, Spain and Russia and a very strong understanding of penal related issues through practical visits to closed institutions in various countries (Canada, Georgia, Japan, Spain, Turkey and England & Wales). 

Vicki Prais is an internationally recognised award-winning human rights lawyer, independent human rights consultant, academic, trainer and career coach with expertise in the protection of prisoners’ rights, prison reform, humane detention and the prohibition of torture and ill-treatment in detention. She brings 29 years of professional experience in International Organisations (the UN, Council of Europe), the British Government (Human Rights Advisor to the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, Government Legal Department), civil society (Amnesty International, Penal Reform International), national human rights institutions (the Scottish Human Rights Commission) and academia (Visiting… Read more

Christian Reed is a Medical Anthropologist and Epidemiologist who specializes in sub-Saharan and East Africa. He has extensive research experience in Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zambia and speaks Portuguese, Swahili, Lunda-Ndembu, and Bemba. His single-authored book "Landscapes of Activism" pertains to pharmaceutical treatment access and HIV/AIDS activism with the matrilineal and Muslim tribes of northern Mozambique. He specializes in the social ramifications of infectious and communicable disease and rural and urban global health. Christian also studies religion with interests in traditional religion and healing, Pentecostalism, Catholicism, Santaria, Voodoo, and spirit possession.

Experienced international trade and logistics expert specializing in infrastructure procurement, supply chain management, cross-border commercial operations, and strategic market development across emerging markets.

Dr David Seddon is a social scientist with more than 40 years experience in Africa and the Middle East, and Nepal, who has produced around 500 country expert witness reports 

Lahra Smith is an Associate Professor in the Walsh School of Foreign Service and the Department of Government at Georgetown University and the Director of the African Studies Program. She is a Political Scientist with a particular interest in citizenship, migration and political development in Africa. She is the author of Making Citizens in Africa: Ethnicity, Gender and National Identity in Ethiopia (Cambridge University Press, 2013), and her other publications have focused on the role of political institutions in addressing conflict based largely on ethnic and language identities.

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.