Sandline International

Established by Tim Spicer, Sandline International was a London-based private military/"mercenary" firm that held contracts in the conflict zones of Papua New Guinea (in 1997), Sierra Leone (in 1998), and in Liberia (in 2003). In each of these places. According to its website, "the business was established in the early 1990s to fill a vacuum in the post cold war era" and its "purpose [was] to offer governments and other legitimate organisations specialist military expertise at a time when western national desire to provide active support to friendly governments, and to support them in conflict resolution, has materially decreased, as has their capability to do so." Sandline International was a private military company based in London, established in the early 1990s. It was involved in conflicts in Papua New Guinea in 1997 (having a contract with the government under the then Prime Minister Julius Chan) causing the Sandline affair, in 1998 in Sierra Leone (having a contract with illegally ousted President Kabbah) and in Liberia in 2003 (in a rebel attempt to evict the then-president Charles Taylor near the end of the civil war). He had been contacted by Rakesh Saxena, an Indian financier hoping that a new government would grant him diamond and mineral concessions. Sandline ceased all operations on 16 April 2004. That this House is greatly concerned to learn that in a class action complaint filed in the USA courts, the London-based mining conglomerate, Rio Tinto, stands accused of having acted in concert with the Government and Military Forces of Papua New Guinea to force the re-opening of the Panguna Copper Mine on Bougainville Island, that the PNG Government contracted the London-based (British Virgin Islands-registered) Sandline International, a firm of mercenaries, to recapture Bougainville and restore Rio Tinto's mine, and that in 1997 Lt. Col. Tim Spicer of Sandline secured a $36 million PNG contract to recapture the mine with a mercenary force; notes that Sandline had shipped weapons to Sierra Leone in 1995, investigated by this House in the 'Arms for Africa' affair; and urges Her Majesty's Government to institute a full public inquiry into this disgraceful affair, and to report back to the House. https://edm.parliament.uk/early-day-motion/19500/rio-tinto-plc-and-uk-mercenaries