2. Does our organisation have experience and capacity in producing written reports analysing the domestic human rights situation in one of the UN languages (English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian or Chinese)? 3. Do you have background information on the issue you want to highlight or will this need to be collected? 4. What time do you have available to produce a written report and conduct domestic advocacy activities using the output from the UN human rights mechanisms? 5. Are there any other national stakeholders working on the same issue or broader issues that may be interested in collaborating on UN advocacy? Possible effects on the relationship between national stakeholders It is very common that engagement with UN human rights mechanisms results in the alteration of the relationship between national stakeholders – this can be both positive and negative. Below is a inexhaustive list of such changes as they have previously occurred with other NGOs as a result of engagement. These changes can be very significant and must thus be carefully considered as part of the overall decision on whether or not to engage. 1. Engagement with UN human rights mechanisms can facilitate an improved dialogue with your government. There are many examples where engagement with UN human rights mechanisms results in a better dialogue, either because the UN 10 Engaging with UN Human Rights Mechanisms: An Introduction provides a more neutral ground where you can dialogue with government representatives, or simply because your organisation, due to its engagement with the UN, is perceived as a more important stakeholder. Lastly, your ability to engage with UN human rights mechanisms may result in the government giving more importance to your voice to avoid criticism from the UN. 2. However, it can also result in a deteriorating relationship caused by the fact that your organisation contacted an international mechanism, which may bring shame or embarrassment to the country. This can lead to exclusion from decision-making processes, loss of privileges, such as access to places of detention, and in the worst case threats and physical targeting of your organisation, individual staff or clients. 3. One of the more commonly reported positive outcomes is that the process of engagement with UN human rights mechanisms has lead to increased collaboration among national NGOs. Often at least parts of the engagement will be done through standing or adhoc national NGO coalitions, and the process of NGOs coming together to conduct international advocacy often has a unifying effect, which can subsequently be utilised for national implementation activities and beyond. It is not possible to make a general assessment of the likeliness of any of these changes manifesting themselves. It therefore has to be carefully assessed based on your own knowledge about the domestic situation in your country.