Dr. Ciara Smyth is an established expert in the field of refugee and immigration law at the international, regional and domestic levels, with a particular focus on the rights of the child. She has published in many of the leading international journals, including the European Law Journal , the Human Rights Law Review , the International Journal of Refugee Law , the European Journal of Migration and Law and the Journal of Refugee Studies . She has written extensively on the Common European Asylum System and her book, European Asylum Law and the Rights of the Child (Routledge, 2014), explores the extent to which the European regional system of refugee protection is consistent with the rights of the child.

Before joining the University of Galway, Ciara worked for a number of non-governmental and intergovernmental organisations in Ireland and abroad, including the Irish Commission for Prisoners Overseas and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Ciara continues to be involved in supporting civil society organisations working in the asylum and immigration space at the local and national level. For example, she is a member of the Legal Advisory Council to the Independent Law Centre at the Irish Refugee Council (IRC) and was formerly chair of the board of directors of the IRC; she recently joined the board of directors of the Immigrant Council of Ireland; and she has worked with Galway City Partnerships Bridge Project, which provides reception and integration supports to asylum seekers and immigrants in Galway City and County. Ciara has also worked with the State on asylum reform and was the only academicmember of the government-appointed McMahon Working Group on Direct Provision. She is the leading academic voice in media discussions on asylum and immigration in Ireland, bringing facts and balance to an otherwise polarised debate.

Ciara holds a PhD from Leiden University, the Netherlands, for which she was awarded a Max Van Der Stoel Human Rights award in 2013; an LL.M in Human Rights (with distinction) from Queens University Belfast; and an LL.B and B.A. from the University of Galway. Ciara is Programme Director of the LL.M in International Migration and Refugee Law and Policy at the Irish Centre for Human Rights, which began in September 2019. She was co-founder of the University of Galway Inclusive Centenaries Scholarship - the forerunner to the current University of Sanctuary Scholarship, and has chaired the University of Sanctuary Scholarship panel since its inception. Ciara was recipient of a Presidents Award for Teaching Excellence in 2018 and a Presidents Award for Research Excellence (Research Supervision) in 2024.

Ciara researches in the areas of refugee and immigration law, policy and practice at the international, European and domestic levels and is interested in how these fields intersect with human rights law. Her specialised interest is the human rights implications of the treatment of migrant, asylum seeking and refugee children. Her recent research includes an exploration of the interaction between mutual trust and the fundamental rights of children under the EU Dublin Regulation; the permissibility of the immigration detention of children under international and regional human rights law; and the implications of adopting a child-rights approach to the refugee definition. Ciara has supervised three PhD students to completion: Dr Stefano Angeleri's PhD research concerned the right to health of irregular migrants; Dr Luke Hamilton, an Irish Research Council scholar, conduced research into constructions of vulnerability in International Refugee Law; and Dr Maria Portuondo conducted comparative research into the impact of human rights law on internment during the Troubles in Northern Ireland and in Guantanamo Bay. Ciara is currently supervising two PhD students: Clara Bosch March and Philip Collins. Clara, an Irish Research Council scholar, is researching the prohibition on the collective expulsion of aliens in the European Convention on Human Rights, with a particular focus on so-called hot returns from Spain and Italy. Philip, who Ciara is co-supervising with Professor Siobhan Mullally, is conducting research into the normative content of the right to asylum and how this right is affected in the US immigration-controlcontext.

Ciara teaches Public International Law and International Protection of Human Rights, at the undergraduate level in the School of Law, and International Refugee Law and the Common European Asylum System, at the postgraduate level in the Irish Centre for Human Rights.