United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, UN Refugee Agency
The UNHCR Archives contain information from the founding of the organisation in 1950 to the present day. They also hold several pre-UNHCR collections, which provide valuable background to the development of protection work. Today, the UNHCR Archives holds about 10 linear kilometres of analog archives and 10 million digital-born archives.
The UNHCR’s Records and Archives Section (RAS) archives many of UNHCR’s main websites and also runs special projects to capture institutional websites and social media accounts.
The UNHCR Archives catalogue provides access to the records held by the Archives at Headquarters.
Access Policy: documents not publicly disclosed are made available after 20 years, unless they fall under a restricted category.
Consultation: by appointment only, which must be booked in advance. Researchers should submit a request form to access the archives and a research application.
Established in 1996 and opened up to researchers in 2000, UNHCR's archive reveals the human stories of modern forced displacement, offering valuable insights into seismic global events. For the team of UNHCR archivists that oversees the collection, it is a living record of the past and present and a source of inspiration and learning for the future.
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Other archives related to the international protection of refugees: