Tom Porteous directs Human Rights Watch's London Office. Since joining Human Rights Watch in October 2006 he has become a leading voice for the protection and promotion of human rights in policy discussions in the UK and in the UK media.

He has focused in particular on the protection of Iraqi refugees and on UK counterterrorism policies at home and abroad. Tom 25 years of experience working in journalism, conflict management and diplomacy in Africa, the Middle East, and Europe. In the 1980s and early 1990s he was a freelance correspondent for The Guardian newspaper, the BBC and other media, first in Cairo and later in Berlin and Morocco.