Anthony McIntyre, a former IRA life sentence prisoner and chief researcher on the Belfast project, defended the archive and blamed Boston College for failing to make clear to him and the interviewees that there was a legal treaty that allowed the British state to seize academic material from the United States.
During a recent trip to South Africa, as a finalist in the Guardian International Development Journalism competition, I realised my disfigurement could have been a potential barrier when interviewing case studies in the townships; I had to make the interviewees feel comfortable looking at my face.
For years I worked at the BBC, making and presenting business programmes for TV and radio, and I was always asking "where are all the women?" The majority of interviewees are of the suit and tie variety: male, pale, stale (hair optional).
Don't miss his remarkable Monbiot Meets video encounters with interviewees including Hazel Blears and Andy Harrison the boss of Easyjet.
Interviewees accepted that behaviour that protects and promotes individual egos and ambitions – a tendency that looms large in "heroic" old-style leadership – has little place today.
Quilliam has been noticeably challenged by some ideas put forth by his interviewees, while latching on to others that confirm his own views.
Arriving in a cloud of dust in an armoured car, and wearing a bright blue "Press" flakjacket and helmet is not the best way to find honest interviewees – in Somalia or anywhere else.
All interviewees stressed that the numbers attracted by extremist ideologies remained negligible compared to India's Muslim population of 180 million, around 14% of the country's overall population of 1.26 billion.
But the interviewees defended their actions and disputed the label "vigilante", saying they were there simply to protect their communities.
Writer-in-residence Christina Petrie, who worked directly with the interviewees, has seen the benefit first-hand.
The majority of abductions by Boko Haram were of Christian women and girls, and many of HRW's interviewees described being threatened with death or violence if they refused to convert to Islam.
