The actions of non-state armed actors (NSAAs) have received significant attention in recent years, especially with regard to how their presence in the field impacts humanitarian space. However, NSAAs are not new, nor are they the only parties responsible for violence against humanitarian workers.
This report reviews UNHCR’s history of engagement with NSAAs over the past 30 years, examining how and why such engagement has occurred, and how it has been transformed. The report takes the view that as a matter of principle UNHCR should engage all NSAAs where necessary and if possible, with the caveat that individual armed groups may force UNHCR to make exceptions to that rule.
The following themes emerged throughout the course of desk and archival research, as well as interviews with senior UNHCR staff.
- Whereas there were “rules to the game” in the 1980s, and rebel groups and liberation movements were perceived to be more predictable and coherent, contemporary NSAAs are nearly impossible to discretely categorise. As a result, engagement with them is extremely context-specific.
- Negotiating access and security is typically the first step in engagement with NSAAs.
- NSAAs are motivated to negotiate by their political or strategic objectives, but also possibly because of how they view UNHCR, particularly if the organisation’s presence is seen to impact the conflict. The acquisition of legitimacy is usually a key objective for cooperative NSAAs.
- Relationships with NSAAs are invariably delicate. While the host government and individual NSAAs may both hold the power to sever or obstruct UNHCR engagement, the organisation itself is also constantly forced to re-evaluate the cost-benefit analysis of operating in areas outside state control. In the cases surveyed for this review, when engagement has collapsed, it was more often a UNHCR decision rather than a ban from host states or NSAAs.
- Respondents indicated that most engagement is governed by the ‘common sense’ of field staff. While they were familiar with handbooks and guides on working with NSAAs, the implication was that such documents are very rarely consulted.
- Concern was also raised that the daily burden of having to assess, and perhaps negotiate, the safety and security of a country operation or field office can take a considerable toll on the mental health of staff.
- Context analysis can be enhanced by better use of academic literature according to some interviewees, who asserted that humanitarians are often too dismissive of the information that independent researchers have to offer.
- International staff often use their own networks to foster engagement with NSAAs. This raised the question of whether staff rotation undermines UNHCR’s ability to maintain diplomatic networks.
