This paper was originally prepared for a UNHCR conference on ‘Strengthening collaboration with humanitarian and human rights NGOs in support of the international refugee protection system’, held at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York on March 11-12 1999. The conference was designed to promote a ‘protection partnership’ between UNHCR and NGOs, with an emphasis on identifying the steps needed to put such a partnership into place. The paper analyzes emerging issues and recent developments as they bear on the three major issues on the conference agenda: cooperation between UNHCR and NGOs on advocacy and the promotion of protection principles; cooperation in specific field settings; and greater sensitivity to protection needs on the part of NGO field operations.
