Experts on countries of origin by country

Dr. Ali is a leading authority on Middle Eastern law and politics, known for combining deep regional knowledge with sharp legal and political analysis. He works at the intersection of courts, policy, and academia, advising on some of the most complex and sensitive issues facing the region. His expertise spans constitutional law, conflict, governance, and international accountability, grounded in long experience with real-world cases and institutions. He is especially valued for his ability to explain complicated Middle Eastern realities clearly, persuasively, and with credibility.

Mohamed Naser Alam is a Barrister-at-Law at the Bar of England and Wales, and an Advocate of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh with over 30 years of comprehensive legal experience spanning immigration and asylum law, human rights, and sophisticated corporate-commercial practice, with a primary geographic focus on Bangladesh. He combines frontline refugee protection work with deep expertise in Bangladesh’s legal, political, and human rights landscape, making him a highly qualified country expert for cases involving Bangladesh.

He served as Legal Counsellor with the UNHCR Urban Refugee Project in Bangladesh, conducting refugee status interviews, assessing protection claims, analysing country-of-origin information, and assisting with third-country resettlement applications. He appeared as a legal representative in numerous Immigration and Asylum appeals before the IAT. He served as a National Consultant for UKAID (DFID) to review the Police Reform Project, the Access to Justice Project, and the Legal Aid Project in Bangladesh. He has in-depth experience and understanding of human rights abuses, arbitrary detention, custodial torture and death, extra-judicial killings, politically motivated false criminal cases, abuse by the law-enforcing agencies, enforced disappearance,… Read more

The Expert is the Founder and Director of Kuwaiti Bedoons Movement. Producing export reports for stateless people as well as, administration and consultations.

Dr Gilberto Algar-Faria (he/him/his) is an expert in the Sri Lankan post-war environment (PhD Politics, Bristol, 2018) with over a decade of experience in writing country expert witness reports. He has written over 50 reports for the UK courts considering asylum appeals from Sri Lankan individuals (including [2020] UKAITUR PA029062016, [2021] UKAITUR PA124362019 and [2024] UKAITUR UI2022005451) and has also contributed to Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada Responses to Information Requests. Previously, Dr Algar-Faria was the Development & Research Manager at the Vancouver Association for Survivors of Torture (2023), and a Sessional Lecturer at the Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia (2021–22). Before that he was a Postdoctoral Research Officer at the University of Oxford (2020–21) and a Senior Research Associate at the University of Bristol (2016–19). He writes reports in a private capacity.

I was born in Basra city, Iraq, which is adjacent to the Kuwaiti border. I am from Alghizzi tribe which is a sub tribe of Alfadhli tribe which is present across the region in particular Kuwait where many Bidoons from this tribe live. The most prominent Bidoon activists from this tribe is Abdulahakim Alfadhli and more others. Having tribal connections provides knowledge and insight into the history, social networks, connections, and the cultural and political landscape. This has placed me in an excellent position to navigate the complex aspects of Bidoons.

In 2002, I moved to the UK and completed my Master’s degree in Environmental Pollution Control at Birmingham City University in 2006. Subsequently, I worked as a researcher and an environmental advisor.

From 2012 to 2019, I worked as a freelance Arabic interpreter with a range of translation and interpreting agencies, as well as directly with many law firms. My primary focus has been working with immigration law firms specialising in immigration and asylum cases. I have accumulated over 10,000 hours of interpreting experience and have interpreted for more than 1,000 clients during their Asylum stages process including their appeal… Read more

Hussein Ali is an independent Country Expert and Expert Witness specialising in country conditions across the Middle East. He provides independent expert reports and litigation support in asylum, immigration and human rights proceedings before UK courts and tribunals. His work focuses on assessing country conditions, evaluating risk on return, examining the availability of state protection, and analysing the social, political, legal and humanitarian circumstances relevant to individuals seeking international protection.

His expertise covers persecution arising from political opinion, religion, ethnicity, gender, family and tribal dynamics, together with the treatment of vulnerable individuals including women, children, victims of trafficking, survivors of honour-based violence, forced marriage, organised criminal activity and extremist organisations. His reports are individually researched, evidence-based and prepared objectively in accordance with the overriding duty of an independent Expert Witness to assist the Court or Tribunal.

Syed Mohammad Ali is a lecturer for the MA in Global Security Studies program ay Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Ali has a PhD in development anthropology, and he has extensive experience working with multilateral, bilateral, government, and non-government organizations on varied international development challenges.

Besides teaching, Dr. Ali is a Non-Resident Scholar at the Middle East Institute in Washington D.C., and he is a Non-Resident Faculty member affiliated with the Beaconhouse National University in Lahore. He is also the author of several peer-reviewed articles, half a dozen book chapters, as well as the book Development, Poverty and Power in Pakistan: The Impact of State and Donor Interventions on Farmers, published by Routledge in 2015. His other publications include numerous policy papers for leading think-tanks including the United States Institute of Peace and the Middle East Institute. 

Dr. Ali writes a weekly op-ed in the Express Tribune, an affiliate of the New York Times in Pakistan, since 2011. He regularly participates in panel discussions on several Pakistani news channels, as well as on international media outlets including Al Jazeera, China Global Television Network, Channel NewsAsia, Voice of America’s televised Urdu Service programs… Read more

I am Yusif Aljarrah, an expert in statelessness with two master’s degrees: an MSc in Business Information Systems Management (BISM) and an MBA. My expertise combines social and humanitarian understanding with strong knowledge of business, management, and information systems. My work focuses on the legal, social, and humanitarian challenges facing stateless communities, while also bringing strategic, organisational, and analytical insight to advocacy, awareness, and practical solutions.

Andrea S. Allen research has addressed matters of race, sexuality, gender, violence, and religion in Brazil and the African Diaspora. Her first book Violence and Desire in Brazilian Lesbian Relationships (Palgrave Macmillan 2015) focused on the experiences of lesbian women in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. Dr. Allen is currently working on a second book project about LGBT evangelical Brazilians, race, religious identity, and sexual subjectivity.

Dr. Allo is a senior legal scholar specializing in human rights, political repression, conflict sensitivity, social movements, political parties, post-conflict reconstruction, peace-building, and transitional justice. A native of the Horn of Africa, Dr. Allo possesses extensive knowledge and experience in the region.

Over the past five years, Dr. Allo has been commissioned by law firms, public bodies, and NGOs to prepare country expert reports on various issues, including political repression, political parties, social movements, protests, nationality laws, healthcare provisions, national service, trafficking, and other cultural and social matters.

Dr. Allo has authored over 100 country expert reports for solicitors and attorneys in the UK, USA, and Europe.

Afrah Almatwari is an academic researcher, Middle East analyst, and professional Arabic-English translator specializing in contemporary Iraqi socio-political dynamics, governance structures, and human rights frameworks. Currently reading for an MRes in Politics at Birkbeck, University of London.

Her research evaluates the complex intersections of formal statutory law, parallel non-state structures, and localized conflict resolution mechanisms.

She produces objective, tribunal-ready country-of-origin assessments for UK legal proceedings, with expertise evaluating gender-specific security risks, state protection capabilities, and tribal clientelism across federal Iraq and the Kurdistan Region (KRI).

Niki Alsford is Professor of Anthropology and Human Geography, and Director for the Institutes for the Study of the Asia Pacific (ISAP), and the Institute for Area and Migration Studies (AMIS) at the University of Central Lancashire. He is a Research Associate at the Centre of Taiwan Studies at SOAS and an Associate Member of the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Oxford. In 2023, he was selected as the Ewha Global Fellow at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, South Korea. Alsford's research focuses primarily on Taiwan, Korea, and the Pacific Islands. He is the book series editor for the Taiwan Series at BRILL, the Korean series at Routledge, and a new series on Asia Pacific Cultures, Communities, and Landscapes at Palgrave Macmillan.  Alsford is the author of Taiwan Lives: A Socio-Political History, published by the University of Washington Press in 2024. 

Alsford’s research focuses primarily on comparative anthropology within the Asia Pacific region. Chief among these is an engagement with Austronesian migration and the maritime cultures of Pacific islands. His present work is bridging a cognitive divide in environmental discussions between Indigenous knowledge and climate science. Alsford is a registered… Read more

Doctor of International Relations (PhD, Jilin University, China) and human rights researcher specialising in political opinion, religion, ethnicity, gender-based and LGBT cases, and nationality across South Asia and China. Specialises in country expert reports, document verification, nationality assessments and expert testimony in the United Kingdom and the United States.

Political scientist with comprehensive experience from research and Country of Origin reports and documents assessments. Research experience on political economy, opposition and political parties, political rights, democratic institutionalisation, NGOs. Expert on human and political rights abuse, political persecution, LGBT persecution, risk of return and of brutal and degrading treatment and torture.

Goal-focused, strategic planner, and passionate leader with extensive experience implementing effective, global strategies to stabilize communities through capacity building, promoting human rights and democratization, and amplifying the value of communication. Skilled in collaborating with all members of the organization to build bridges across ideological divides, trusted to tailor language, tone, style, and format to match the audience. Passionate educator with two years’ experience as a High School Principal. Proactively pursues the development and execution of ethical leadership, personnel management, and clear research/discovery goals with comprehensive plans delivering measurable impact to in-house operations. 

An accomplished expert in Lebanese, Levantine, and MENA law, politics, and culture, Dr. Isaac Andakian brings extensive experience and a proven track record in political advisory roles. From 2001 to 2009, Dr. Andakian served as a trusted senior political adviser to two members of the Lebanese Parliament and a minister in the Lebanese cabinet. Over nine years, he counseled the Armenian Orthodox Community Court of Lebanon and the Municipality of the City of Anjar, Lebanon, from 2003 to 2012.

During Dr. Andakian’s… Read more

Danielle Annoni is an associate professor of International Law and Human Rights at the Federal University of Parana (UFPR-Brazil), where she coordinates the Human Rights Observatory and Legal Practice in Human Rights and Migration. She has been conducting human rights research for 18 years. She is an educator, a mother and an active human rights defender, with a focus on migration, gender and the Latin American human rights protection system. Because of her work developed with vulnerable groups regarding the education of labor rights, the empowering of women through handicraft and gastronomy fairs, advocacy in the mediation of cultural conflicts, and access to justice and education, she has received several awards.

PhD in Social Science, sociologist and human rights expert specialising in country conditions analysis related to political violence, forced displacement, and asylum claims in Latin America. 

Dr Abdoul Aziz Dieng is a Senegalese-born, UK-based Senegal Country Expert and Sociolinguistic Consultant specialising in Senegalese language, culture, migration, diaspora identity and multilingual practices. His doctoral research focused on Senegalese transmigrants and their cultural and language practices and is the author of Urban Wolof across Borders: Translanguaging while Transmigrating (2024, Palgrave).

His expertise is particularly relevant to asylum and immigration matters involving Senegal, including Wolof and Fula/Pulaar language issues, cultural plausibility, family and community dynamics, migration histories, diaspora experience, reintegration, and the interpretation of Senegalese social and linguistic practices. He is also NRPSI-registered and a full member of the Chartered Institute of Linguists.

Sergen Bahceci is a political anthropologist who examines violence and its role in constituting everyday life and lived experiences. He completed a PhD in Anthropology at LSE in 2023. For his doctoral research, he conducted 20 months of ethnographic fieldwork in northern Cyprus among elderly war veterans and younger generations of Cypriots who were born after the island’s civil war (1955 - 1974).

Following his PhD, he worked as a researcher at the University of Oxford’s Centre for Criminology where he was employed to conduct digital ethnographic fieldwork in Macclesfield, England, on everyday experiences of crime-related insecurity. He previously taught anthropology at Goldsmiths and University College London, and also worked for the UN Committee on Missing Persons in Cyprus in 2020. He has also provided a COI expert witness report for a deportation order appeal tribunal.