I began working for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in 2006, and since then have worked as a Protection Officer and Resettlement Expert on deployment or mission in Uganda, Kenya, the Central African Republic, Senegal, Guinea and Jordan. I have interviewed and/or reviewed the cases of several thousand refugees in West and East Africa and the Middle East about their reasons for flight and conditions in their asylum countries. I have researched, written and reviewed country of origin information for all of these refugees. Between deployments, I have worked in a volunteer capacity with recently-resettled refugees in the US through the refugee resettlement programs administered by Catholic Charities and Lutheran Family Services.
I hold MAs in English Literature (University of Edinburgh) and Understanding and Securing Human Rights (University of London, with Distinction). Before working with UNHCR, I was a human rights educator for Amnesty International.
I am also a writer who has published extensively on human rights and development education, globalization and conflict, refugee experiences, and travel in Africa and the Middle East.
I combine my experience in refugee resettlement and writing to produce high-quality country expert reports. I have written over 150 reports for asylum, immigration and criminal lawyers in the UK, US and Canada. I was the FGM expert for the first successful FGM prosecution in the UK, and the FGM and Sierra Leone expert for a landmark country guidance case on Sierra Leone and FGM protection orders. Please contact me for judges’ remarks on my reports.
I am available to write country expert reports on the following countries:
West and Central Africa:
Cote d'Ivoire
Sierra Leone
Gambia
Liberia
Guinea
Central African Republic
Democratic Republic of Congo
East Africa:
Sudan (including Darfur)
South Sudan
Somalia
Ethiopia
Eritrea
Uganda
Rwanda
Burundi
Middle East:
Iraq
Kuwaiti Bidoons (stateless persons from Kuwait)
My expertise in the asylum field also includes claims related to FGM, persecution of minority clans, LGBT communities, sexual and gender based violence and political persecution.