* March 16 – Sandline affair: On Bougainville Island, soldiers of commander Jerry Singirok arrest Tim Spicer and his mercenaries of the Sandline International.

** Mercenaries of Sandline International withdraw from Papua New Guinea.

In 1996, Prime Minister Sir Julius Chan requested the help of Sandline International, a private military company previously involved in supplying mercenaries in the civil war in Sierra Leone, to put down the rebellion.

In 1997, the Chan government's multi-million-dollar contract with Sandline International, a mercenary organization, to counter separatist guerrilla warfare on Bougainville caused the Sandline affair, with immense public protests and a 10-day mutiny by the underpaid national army.

Sandline International was a private military company based in London, established in the early 1990s.

* Sandline International

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# REDIRECT Sandline International

Executive Outcomes was often loosely linked with the United Kingdom private military company Sandline International, but in 1997 Sandline directly subcontracted Executive Outcomes for their operation in Papua New Guinea to oust the rebels holding the Pangua mine on Bougainville Island which led to the so-called " Sandline affair " when news of the government's intention to hire mercenaries was leaked to the Australian press.

Thus began the Sandline affair, where the government of Papua New Guinea attempted to hire mercenaries from Sandline International, a London-based private military company, composed primarily of former British and South African special forces soldiers, which had been involved in the civil wars in Angola and Sierra Leone.

The event was named after Sandline International, a UK-based private military company force.

Through some overseas contacts, Ijape was put in contact with Tim Spicer OBE, an ex-Colonel in the Scots Guards, who had recently founded Sandline International, a company specialising in providing arms, equipment, and contractors to participate in conflicts.

Then, in 1996, Tim Spicer, an ex-Colonel in the Scots Guards, who had recently founded the mercenary firm Sandline International, met with Singirok.

Mann went on to establish Sandline International with fellow ex-Scots Guards Colonel Tim Spicer in 1996.

Sandline International announced the closure of the company's operations on 16 April 2004.

* – covers the birth and rise of Executive Outcomes and Sandline as well as the events in Sierra Leone and Bougainville

** Sandline affair: Australian newspapers publish stories that the government of Papua New Guinea has brought mercenaries onto Bougainville Island.

** Julius Chan resigns as prime minister of Papua New Guinea, ending the Sandline affair.

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 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 ).

The Sandline affair of 1997 was a political scandal that became one of the defining moments in the history of Papua New Guinea, and particularly that of the conflict in Bougainville.

The Sandline affair was a political scandal that became one of the defining moments in the history of Papua New Guinea, and particularly that of the conflict in Bougainville.

Later that year, Spicer met Chris Haiveta, the Deputy Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, and convinced him of the benefits of using Sandline mercenaries to end the Bougainville conflict permanently, neutralise the Bougainville Revolutionary Army, and reopen the controversial copper mine at Panguna.

While it briefly moved the Papua New Guinean people behind the idea, the international furore also hardened the dislike that Jerry Singirok had for the Sandline deal.

Jerry Singirok was the commander of the Papua New Guinea Defence Force throughout the Sandline affair of 1997.

The company operated mostly in Angola and Sierra Leone, but in 1997 Sandline received a commission from the government of Papua New Guinea to suppress a rebellion on the island of Bougainville and the company came to international prominence, but received much negative publicity following the Sandline affair.

Sandline ceased all operations on 16 April 2004.

Irish Studies in International Affairs 14: 95 – 106.

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International Journal of Plant Sciences 165: 325 – 335.

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