First birth in 17 years on troubled Pacific outpost

Pitcairn Island, the tiny Pacific outpost colonised by the mutineers of HMS Bounty in the 18th century, has announced its first birth in 17 years.

Emily Rose Christian, weighing 8lb 4oz (3.8kg), takes to 48 the population of the British administered island, which lies in the middle of the Pacific Ocean between New Zealand and Peru.

Emily, born on Sunday, is a ninth generation descendant of Fletcher Christian, the English seaman who led the infamous mutiny against Captain Bligh in 1789 and then settled on the fertile two square mile lump of rock, establishing a puritanical community in which dancing and drinking were forbidden.

Now the islanders fear the life of Pitcairn might be coming to an end. Last month seven men pleaded not guilty before a British convened court to multiple charges of sexual assault on women and children.