Brian Barbour

Brian currently serves as Senior Refugee Protection Advisor at Act for Peace. He is also an Affiliate of the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at the University of New South Wales.

Brian is undertaking a PhD looking at ‘Building New State Asylum Systems from the Ground Up in Asia’. He has worked on refugee protection in Asia, mostly as a practitioner, since 2008. As an attorney, he has represented hundreds of asylum claimants in both UNHCR and government systems. Brian has engaged with a number of governments in the Asian region with the setup of new, and strengthening of existing, asylum systems. Brian has also conducted research with UNHCR, to develop tools and guidance to support the transition of some of its functions from UNHCR to a new State asylum system and on RSD backlog prevention and reduction. Brian also supports the work of local non-governmental organizations and refugee-led initiatives, and is a founding member of the Asia Pacific Refugee Rights Network.