
I am an international lawyer, dealing primarily with the legal aspects of refugee flows, migration, and forced displacement. I am also involved with related issues, including statelessness, deprivation of citizenship, ‘counter-terrorism’, and the challenges to human rights raised by the widespread emphasis globally on ‘securitisation’, and more recently as a consequence of COVID-19. In addition, I remain particularly interested in the activities of international and regional organisations, both in contributing to the resolution of humanitarian problems and as potentially ‘representative’ forums. I practised as a Barrister at Blackstone Chambers, London, from 2002-2018, and from July 2017–December 2021, I was Professor in the Faculty of Law & Justice and the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at the University of New South Wales; I have been an Honorary Professor since January 2022. In February 2020, I was awarded the Stefan A. Riesenfeld Memorial Award at Berkeley Law for my contributions to international law and international refugee law, and in September 2021, Oxford University Press published the fourth edition of The Refugee in International Law (with Professor Jane McAdam and Emma Dunlop).
External homepages:
http://www.kaldorcentre.unsw.edu.au/
- Emeritus Fellow, All Souls College (from 2014)
- Senior Research Fellow, All Souls College (from 2002 to 2014)
- Professor of International Refugee Law, University of Oxford (from 1998 to 2014)
- Rubin Director of Research, Institute of European Studies, University of Oxford (from 1997 to 2002)
- Professor of Asylum Law, University of Amsterdam (from 1994 to 1999)
- Professor of Law, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada (from 1989 to 1997)
- Senior Legal Research Officer and variously Legal Adviser, Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, London, Sydney, Geneva (from 1976 to 1988)
- Visiting Lecturer, Public International Law, Kingston Polytechnic, Kingston-upon-Thames (from 1973 to 1976)
- Lecturer, later Senior Lecturer, The College of Law, London (from 1971 to 1976)
- Undergraduate and Postgraduate, Wadham College, Oxford (from 1965 to 1974)
- Public international law, with particular interests in immigration, refugees, statelessness and asylum, the use of force, elections and electoral standards
- ‘A Short History of International Refugee Law: The Early Years’
- ‘The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the Sources of International Refugee Law’, (2020) 69 International and Comparative Law Quarterly 1
- ‘A Brief and Somewhat Sceptical Perspective on the International Organization for Migration’, Refugee Studies Centre Workshop, ‘IOM: The UN Migration Agency?’, Oxford, 2 February 2019
- ‘United Nations Treaty-Making: Refugees and Stateless Persons’, in Simon Chesterman, David Malone & Santiago Villalpando, eds., Oxford Handbook of United Nations Treaties, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019, Ch. 22, 427-49
- 'The Global Compacts and the Future of Refugee and Migrant Protection in the Asia Pacific Region’, (2018) 30 International Journal of Refugee Law 674-683
- with Philippe Weckel, eds. Protection des migrants et des réfugiés au XXIe siècle: Aspects de droit international/Migration and Refugee Protection in the 21st Century: International Legal Aspects, Hague Academy of International Law, Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2015
- 'Asylum (Colombia v. Peru), 1949 and Request for Interpretation of the Judgment of 20 November 1950 in the Asylum Case (Colombia v. Peru), 1950', in Paula Wojcikiewicz Almeida & Jean-Marc Sorel, eds., Latin America and the International Court of Justice: Contributions to International Law, London: Routledge, 2017, 170-82
- 'Setting the Scene: Refugees, Asylum Seekers, and Migrants at Sea – The Need for a Long-Term, Protection-Centred Vision', in Violeta Moreno-Lax & Efthymios Papastavridis, eds., 'Boat Refugees' and Migrants at Sea: A Comprehensive Approach, Leiden: Brill Nijhoff, 2017, 17-31
- 'The Movements of People between States in the 21st Century: An Agenda for Urgent Institutional Change', (2016) 28 International Journal of Refugee Law 679
- 'The Mediterranean Papers: Athens, Naples, and Istanbul', (2016) 28 International Journal of Refugee Law 276
- ‘Migration and Forced Migration Today: Challenges for the Rule of Law’, in Guy S. Goodwin-Gill & Philippe Weckel, eds., Protection des migrants et des réfugiés au XXIe siècle: Aspects de droit international/Migration and Refugee Protection in the 21st Century: International Legal Aspects, Hague Academy of International Law, Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2015, 3-22
- 'Current Challenges in Refugee Law', in Jean-Pierre Gauci, Mariagiulia Giuffré & Evangelina (Lilian) Tsourdi, eds., Exploring the Boundaries of Refugee Law: Current Protection Challenges, Leiden: Brill Nijhoff, 2015, 9-28
- ‘Non-Refoulement, Temporary Refuge, and the “New” Asylum Seekers’, in David Cantor & Jean-François Durieux, eds., Refuge from Inhumanity? War Refugees and International Humanitarian Law, Leiden: Brill, 2014, 433-59.
- ‘The International Law of Refugee Protection’, in Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Gil Loescher, Katy Long & Nando Sigona, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014, 36-47.
- ‘The Dynamic of International Refugee Law’, (2013) 25 International Journal of Refugee Law, 651.
- 'Palestine, UN Membership and Popular Representation: International Legal Challenges and Strategic Options’, in Mutaz Qafisheh, ed., Palestine Membership in the United Nations: Legal and Practical Implications, Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013, 30-44.
- ‘The Right to Seek Asylum: Interception at Sea and the Principle of Non-refoulement’, (2011) 23 International Journal of Refugee Law 443.
- ‘The Politics of Refugee Protection’, (2008) 27(1) Refugee Survey Quarterly 8.
- (ed. with Hélène Lambert), The Limits of Transnational Law: Refugee Law, Policy Harmonization and Judicial Dialogue in the European Union, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
- (ed. with Ian Brownlie, Q.C.), Brownlie’s Documents on Human Rights, 6th edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.
- Free and Fair Elections, 2nd revised and expanded edn. (Geneva: Inter-Parliamentary Union, 2006)
- ‘Mr Al-Jedda, Deprivation of Citizenship, and International Law’, paper (revised) presented at Middlesex University, 14 February 2014
- ‘Deprivation of Citizenship resulting in Statelessness and its Implications in International Law: Opinion’, 12 March 2014
- ‘Deprivation of Citizenship resulting in Statelessness and its Implications in International Law: Further Comments’, 6 April 2014
- ‘Deprivation of Citizenship, Statelessness and International Law: More Authority (if it were needed...)’, 5 May 2014