Pashto & Dari/Farsi Linguist · Law Society Accredited Senior Caseworker (Immigration & Asylum)
UK-based Afghanistan country expert with more than 25 years of academic, policy, research and professional experience relating to Afghanistan. His background spans the United Nations, Afghan government institutions, the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), the Centre for Conflict and Peace Studies (CAPS), and BBC Monitoring. His doctoral research examined Afghan state-building and political order.
Politics and governance, the Taliban and insurgency, conflict and security, state-building, political order, international intervention, aid and development, country-of-origin information and Afghan-language source analysis. As a native Pashto and Dari/Farsi speaker, Dr Popalzai can examine Afghan-language country information, political terminology, register and source material directly.
Read about Afghanistan country-expert work →Specialist linguistic work including Afghan-language source analysis, substantial translation projects, literary and book translation, professional texts, review and quality assurance. Professional services are also available in Urdu.
Read about Pashto & Dari/Farsi linguistic work →Law Society Accredited Senior Caseworker (Immigration & Asylum), with current professional experience in asylum, international protection and human rights matters. Immigration advice is not provided through this website.
View immigration & asylum experience →A clear, professional route from initial enquiry to independent country-expert evidence.
Outline the case, Afghanistan issues, deadline and proposed questions.
The proposed instruction is reviewed for scope, independence, availability and any conflict.
Terms are agreed and relevant materials are provided through an appropriate method.
The report is prepared independently and in accordance with the expert’s overriding duty to the court or tribunal—to provide impartial, objective evidence regardless of the interests of the instructing party.
Selected research on Afghan state-building, political order, security and international intervention.