This Technical Report gives general requirements for bodies providing accreditation of inspection bodies so that the accreditations granted and the services covered by the accreditations may be recognized at a national or an international level and the body operating the accreditation system may be recognized at national or international level as competent and reliable. Users of accreditation, other than the inspection body, may require compliance with requirements additional to those specified in this Technical Report.The object of this Technical Report is to provide the basis for the setting up and operation of an accreditation body and to facilitate agreements, between such bodies, on mutual recognition of accreditation of inspection bodies.NOTE 1 It is recognized that agreements on mutual recognition of accreditations aimed at the removal of barriers to cross-border trade may have to cover other aspects not explicitly specified in these general requirements, such as exchange of any relevant information between inspection bodies and exchange of staff or training programmes. In particular, with a view to creating confidence and harmonizing the interpretation and implementation of standards, each accreditation body should encourage technical cooperation and exchange of experience among inspection bodies accredited by it, and should be prepared to exchange information on accreditation procedures and practices with other accreditation bodies.NOTE 2 This Technical Report is based on ISO/IEC Guide 58:1993, and on ISO/IEC Guide 61:1996. To facilitate a comparison between requirements on bodies that accredit inspection bodies, testing laboratories and certification bodies, an extensive cross-reference table between the clauses of this Technical Report and the corresponding clauses of the two above-mentioned Guides has been prepared and is available on request.