Lucia Bird Ruiz-Benitez de Lugo

GI-TOC staff member

Lucia Bird Ruiz-Benitez de Lugo

Director of the West Africa Observatory, Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime

Lucia is the Director of the Observatory of Illicit Economies in West Africa at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime. Lucia has published extensively on a range of organized crime types, including human smuggling, human trafficking, drugs trafficking and cyber-crime, with a focus on dynamics in Africa. Prior to joining the organisation, Lucia worked as legal and policy adviser to the Planning and Development Department of the Punjab Government, Pakistan, and before that held the same role at the Ministry of Finance, Ghana. During this time Lucia was affiliated with Oxford Policy Management, a development consultancy headquartered in the UK. Prior to this Lucia worked as a corporate lawyer in London.

Related experts

View all

View Profile

Ludmila Quirós

Researcher, Center for Studies on Transnational Organized Crime (CeCOT), IRI, UNLP.
View Profile

Max Gallien

Senior Fellow, Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime
View Profile

Moses Atogo Unongu

Principal Intelligence Officer, National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP)
View Profile

Josefina Salomón
View Profile

Fiona Mangan

Research Director, Justice + Security in Transitions
View Profile

Radha Barooah

Regional Field Coordinator, Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime
View Profile

Nicholas Bismarck Doe

Customs Collector, Liberia Revenue Authority
View Profile

Timothy Wittig

Director of the Center for Security and Sustainability and Assistant Professor of Globalization Studies and Humanitarian Action, University of Groningen
View Profile

Julie Werbel

Senior Advisor, Countering Violent Extremism, US Agency for International Development
View Profile

Hai Thanh Luong

Research Fellow, School of Social Science, University of Queensland
View Profile

Eduardo Vetere

Vice-President & Secretary-General, International Association of Anti-Corruption Authorities (IAACA)
View Profile

Dr Dalia Ghanem

Senior researcher/analyst at the European Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS)

GI-TOC staff member