Young Iraqi film students tell their own stories from Mosul




ln the war-ravaged northern Iraqi city of Mosul, 19 students 

are getting a chance to make their first short films 

(AFP/Zaid AL-OBEIDI)

Tony Gamal-Gabriel
Thu, December 23, 2021

A budding Iraqi filmmaker yells "action!" as an actress clambers over rubble in Mosul's Old City, proud students of a nascent film school in the former jihadist bastion.

Mosul still bears the scars of the brutal reign of the Islamic State group, who overran the northern Iraqi city in 2014 and imposed their ultraconservative interpretation of Islamic law.

They destroyed everything from centuries-old churches to musical instruments, before being routed in a devastating battle in 2017.

Now, in a collaboration between the Mosul fine arts academy, a Belgian theatre company and UN cultural agency UNESCO, 19 students are getting a chance to make their first short films.

"We live in Mosul, we know everything that happened," said 20-year-old theatre student Mohammed Fawaz. "We want to show it all to the world through cinema."

Over a four-month course, students get a taste of everything from writing and shooting to acting and editing, according to Milo Rau, artistic director of Belgian NTGent theatre company who is behind the initiative.

Cameras and microphones in hand, the students are now hitting Mosul's streets to tell stories from their wounded city.

- 'Stone Age to modernity' -

An actress dressed as a bride searches for her husband, only to discover he has stepped on a land mine.

Children and other residents crowd around curiously, while a neighbour refuses to turn off a noisy generator.

"We're losing the light," one of the instructors reminds students, as the December sun goes down.

Studying at the fine arts academy after the IS defeat was a bit like "passing from the Stone Age to modernity", said student Fawaz.

A fan of blockbuster movies like the Marvel and "Fast and Furious" franchises, Fawaz spent several of his teen years at home with no television or schooling under the extremists, learning English through books and thanks to a neighbour.

He and some classmates have already decided "to make films on Mosul and its war", Fawaz said.

After a month-long intensive session in October, the students have been trying out different roles as they pair up to make their films, said Belgian instructor, cameraman and filmmaker Daniel Demoustier.

All the equipment like lenses and sound gear brought in from abroad will stay, he said, with the goal for the students to "pick it up again and start making their films on their own".

Even if only three or four do so, "that will be a great success", he said.

- 'Longing for childhood' -

Tamara Jamal, 19, said the course was her "first experience" with cinema.

Her short film tells the story of a young girl whose father beats her mother, while others have looked at issues including early marriage.

"Most of the students prefer to talk about stories where children play the main role," said Susana AbdulMajid, an Iraqi-German actress and teacher whose family is originally from Mosul.

Young people in the city "have gone through a lot of difficult and horrible things... there is a kind of longing for childhood, and also for a time of innocence", she said.

The students' nine works, each lasting up to five minutes, will be screened in Mosul in February before being presented to European festivals, said Rau.

His production of "Orestes in Mosul" -- an adaptation of Aeschylus's ancient Greek tragedy -- was produced in 2018-2019 with the participation of local students.

The goal now is to secure funding to keep the cinema department running, he said.

The next step will be "to have a small Mosul film festival... continuing what we started".

tgg/lg/pjm

Two more Hong Kong universities remove Tiananmen artwork
 

STALIN SCHOOL OF FALSIFICATION; 

NOW YOU SEE THEM , NOW YOU DON'T

This combination image shows where the 'Goddess of Democracy' statue once stood on the campus of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (AFP/Daniel SUEN, Bertha WANG)


Thu, December 23, 2021

Two Hong Kong universities on Friday removed sculptures marking Beijing's 1989 crackdown on Tiananmen Square democracy protesters, as authorities steadily erase all remaining traces of the deadly event from the southern Chinese territory.

The removals come a day after Hong Kong's oldest university took down a statue commemorating the bloody crackdown, sparking outcry by activists and dissident artists in the city and abroad.

Hong Kong was for a long time the only place in China where mass remembrance of Tiananmen was tolerated, with thousands gathering each year to mourn democracy protesters killed by Chinese troops.

The city's university campuses marked the crackdown with statues commemorating the events in a vivid illustration of the freedoms the semi-autonomous territory enjoyed.

But early Friday, the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) removed the "Goddess of Democracy" from its campus.

The sculpture by Chen Weiming -- a six-metre (21-foot) replica of the giant statue that students erected in Tiananmen Square -- was a potent symbol of Hong Kong's democracy movement.

Around the same time, the Lingnan University of Hong Kong removed another relief sculpture marking the Tiananmen crackdown, also created by Chen, and painted over a wall bearing an image of the Goddess of Democracy.

The removals took place on Christmas Eve, when many students were on break and away from campus.

The US-based artist Chen expressed "regret and anger" at the removal of his works, adding that the universities behaved "illegally and unreasonably".

"They acted like a thief in the night", Chen told AFP. "It was the opposite of being clean and above board... They were afraid of exposure and of a backlash from students and alumni."

Chen said the works were only on loan to the schools and that he would hire a lawyer to take legal action if the sculptures were damaged.

CUHK said it removed the "unauthorised statue" after an internal assessment, adding that the groups responsible for moving it to the campus in 2010 were no longer functional.

Lingnan University said it had taken down its statue after having "reviewed and assessed items on campus that may pose legal and safety risks to the university community."

- Students cry 'shame' -

On Friday afternoon, flyers with the Chinese character for "shame" were spotted in Lingnan University where the relief used to be, as well as at other locations on campus.

Two young women told AFP they were Lingnan alumni responsible for putting up the flyers, saying that they were angered by the school's move.

"They are erasing history... I don't want to be forced to forget," said a woman surnamed Tsang, who said she was from mainland China.

Georgetown Law School scholar Eric Lai said the removal of CUHK's Goddess of Democracy statue reflected a "further kowtowing of local (university) authorities to the national security regime."

Lai was the president of CUHK's student union when the statue was moved to the campus in 2010.

"As my student union folks and I insisted, the New Goddess of Democracy was installed in CUHK campus with estimated 2,000 students and citizens witnessing, amid the school management's rejection," Lai tweeted, adding that the statue became a landmark of student protest events.

CUHK's student union, known for its active role in Hong Kong's democracy movement spanning 50 years, disbanded in October.

Meanwhile, the statues' removal was celebrated by some of the 90 politicians elected to Hong Kong's legislature on Sunday under Beijing-imposed "patriots only" rules.

"There were many political hacks who manipulated populist sentiments and incited hatred using the banner of democracy and freedom. Today, Hong Kongers can finally breathe easy and return to normal life," wrote Horace Cheung, vice chair of Hong Kong's largest pro-China party DAB.

Beijing is remoulding Hong Kong in its own image after democracy protests two years ago and commemorating Tiananmen has effectively been criminalised.

An annual candlelight vigil to mark the June 4 crackdown has been banned for the past two years, with authorities citing security and pandemic fears.

In September, police raided a museum commemorating Tiananmen and seized exhibits, under a sweeping national security law that Beijing imposed on Hong Kong last year to curb dissent after huge and often violent democracy protests.

The museum had previously been shuttered as authorities said it lacked the relevant licence.

Leon Trotsky: The Stalin School of Falsification (1937) (marxists.org)

Mongolian doctors trek to remote areas to give herders jabs




Mongolia's vaccination programme has seen huge take-up with more than 90 percent of adults receiving two jabs (AFP/Byambasuren BYAMBA-OCHIR)

Khaliun Bayartsogt
Fri, December 24, 2021, 12:38 AM·3 min read

Nurse Sodkhuu Galbadrakh clutches a box of Covid-19 vaccines on his lap as he journeys along a bumpy track through a remote region of the Mongolian steppe, going home to home to offer booster doses to herders.

The country of three million has taken some of the world's toughest and most enduring measures against the coronavirus pandemic, shutting schools for much of the last two years and closing borders.

Its vaccination programme has seen huge take-up with more than 90 percent of adults receiving two jabs.

But the booster programme is seeing patchier success among nomadic communities thanks to both online misinformation and the sheer logistical challenge that comes with reaching remote communities in such a vast nation.

Mongolia is one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world and about one-third of the population are nomadic.

"During the first wave, people were queuing outside (for vaccines) and I was working until 9pm," said Sodkhuu. "There were days I didn't go home. Now, only five to six people come to get the booster shot per day."

He said he calls herders daily to try and arrange the third shot but often can't get through, especially with poor phone reception in pastureland.

This meant health officials had no choice but to go to the herders, he added.

- Mixed results -

After finding several ger homes empty, Sodkhuu -- accompanied by doctor Enkhjargal Purev -- met 37-year-old herder Enkhmaa Purev, who received the booster.

"I was planning on getting my booster shot the next time I visited the soum (town) centre," the herder told AFP, saying she had driven 160 kilometres earlier this year with her husband to get their first doses.

Another herder, named Badamkhuu, couldn't get the jab due to high blood pressure -- a common problem among herders due to a high cholesterol diet.

"I had extremely high blood pressure after the second dose [of Sinopharm], so I don’t want any more vaccines," said 65-year-old herder Dulamsuren Gombojav, who also declined the jab when offered by Sodkhuu.

According to Mongolia's health ministry there have been 667,391 Covid cases and nearly 2,000 deaths.

Cases have plummeted since vaccines were rolled out, and Ulaanbaatar is anxious progress is not lost through jab hesitancy.

Only around 45 percent of adults have had a booster vaccine.

"Young people spread rumours or have a perception that Covid is just like flu, and they can recover easily, like the flu," Sodkhuu told AFP on the outreach drive.

"(They) think that they don't need vaccines or boosters."

On the day AFP joined the medical team, they had hoped to administer booster shots to six herder families. Only three accepted.

But Batbayar Ochirbat, the official leading the vaccination programme, said trust is gradually improving in the third jab.

Since September when daily cases peaked at more than 3,000, numbers have rolled down to an average of 200 daily cases, which he says is partly down to boosters.

"People started to build trust after they saw vaccinated people have booster shots, develop no symptoms, and not get sick," he said.

str-rox/jta/reb

A NIHILST NOT AN ANARCHIST
'Unabomber' Ted Kaczynski transferred to prison medical facility

Ted Kaczynski, known as the "Unabomber," was transferred to Federal Medical Center Butner from a Supermax facility in Colorado on Thursday. 

File Photo by Laura Leigh Palmer/UPI | License Photo

Dec. 23 (UPI) -- "Unabomber" Ted Kaczynski was transferred to a federal medical center in North Carolina, the Federal Bureau of Prisons said Thursday.

The BOP said Kaczynski, 79, was transferred to the Federal Medical Center Butner on Dec. 14 from a Supermax facility in Florence, Colo., but details about his health were not immediately released.

"For safety and security reasons, we do not discuss the specific conditions of an inmate's confinement, to include medical information or reasons for transfer/redesignation," BOP said.

Kaczynski's brother, David Kaczynski said he had been told recently by someone who corresponds with his brother that he had been transferred to a different facility but was not told why, The Washington Post reported.

Kaczynski is serving eight life sentences after pleading guilty in 1998 to sending bombs in the mail that killed three people and injured 23 others from 1978-1995.

Renovation project in Scotland uncovers message in a bottle from 1967


Workers doing renovations at the Victorian Market Hall in Inverness, Scotland, found a message in a bottle from a man who worked on a previous construction project in 1967. Photo courtesy of the Highland Council

Dec. 23 (UPI) -- Workers renovating a market hall in Scotland found a message in a bottle from a mason who worked on the building in 1967.

Jo Murray, manager of the Victorian Market in Inverness, said workers doing renovations at the Victorian Market Hall found a message from a man who worked on the last set of major renovations, which were completed in 1967.

"We expected to find some interesting things at demolition stage of the build, and we were not disappointed. Following the last major piece of work done in 1967 we found a message in a bottle from a proud workman," Murray said in a news release from the Highland Council.

"In an empty quarter bottle of vodka, neatly buried underneath the floor, was a note written by J. T. T. Thomson, a mason from Shetland. The note reads 'J. T. T. Thomson. Mason. Murness, Uyeasound, Unst, Shetland. Inverness address 40 Deny St. Age 41. Finished building and tiling 20.6.67,'" Murray said.

The renovation project began in January 2021 and is expected to be completed by mid-2022.

Myanmar rescuers call off jade mine landslide recovery operation


Rescuers in northern Myanmar called off the search operation after a landslide at an illegal jade mine with dozens still missing and presumed dead (AFP/Handout)


Fri, December 24, 2021

Rescuers in northern Myanmar said the confirmed death toll from a landslide at an illegal jade mine had risen to six on Friday as they called off the search operation with dozens still missing and presumed dead.

Scores die each year working in the country's lucrative but poorly regulated jade trade, which sees low-paid migrant workers scrape out gems highly coveted in neighbouring China.

Authorities had initially estimated at least 70 people were feared missing after the torrent of rocks and earth swept into the lake early Wednesday, but later said that they were still trying to confirm that figure.


"We called off the search at 4:30 pm today. With two recovered today, six dead bodies in total were recovered," Ko Jack of Myanmar Rescue Organisation told AFP.

He said his team would no longer conduct diving operations as the bodies of those still missing were likely buried underneath soil and rubble.

The miners at Hpakant come from across Myanmar to scratch a living picking through the piles of waste left by industrial mining firms in hopes of finding an overlooked hunk of jade.

Determining how many people were working when the disaster struck would be difficult, rescuers said, with families hesitant to admit their relatives were there and survivors unwilling to come forward.

Rescuers said increased pressure from the weight of dumped soil and rock had pushed the ground downhill into the nearby lake.

Jade and other abundant natural resources in northern Myanmar -- including timber, gold and amber -- have helped finance both sides of a decades-long civil war between ethnic Kachin insurgents and the military.

Civilians are frequently trapped in the middle of the fight for control of the mines and their lucrative revenues, with a rampant drug and arms trade further curdling the conflict.

Last year, heavy rainfall triggered a massive landslide in Hpakant that entombed nearly 300 miners.

bur-rma/ssy

Success of online medical portal Doctolib highlights the French state’s failure to digitise

by David Bird
December 24, 2021
in France

Issued on: 24/12/2021 

French company Doctolib’s website and app allow users to book medical appointments through an online portal. They boomed in popularity during the Covid-19 pandemic – allowing many to access both vaccinations and consultations with relative ease – and the company now plans to expand to Italy and Germany. But the emergence of a private firm to fill a gap in France’s public health sector also highlights the country’s failure to modernise the medical services industry.

The French government’s latest Covid-19 announcements are always followed by a mad rush to the Doctolib website and app, with people rapidly filling all available time slots. When it was first announced that a health pass would be required to access restaurants and public venues back in July, some 1.35 million people raced to book a vaccine appointment, crashing Doctolib’s site.

In the 24 hours after Health Minister Olivier Véran announced that a third jab would be required for the health pass to continue being valid from January 15, more than 1.2 million people rushed to Doctolib to book a booster.

With 60 million users and an estimated turnover of between €150 million and €200 million in 2020, Doctolib has established itself as a French tech success story.

This French “unicorn” – meaning a start-up whose valuation has exceeded $1 billion without going public – has seen its payroll triple since it was set up in 2013. With more than 1,700 employees, the company has continued to expand: It currently has more than 250 job offers posted on its website for locations in France, Germany and Italy. In October, it acquired an Italian company performing the same service, Dottori.it.
Data stored by Amazon

Doctolib has become a key player in vaccination in France ever since Covid-19 emerged, offering access to nearly 90 percent of French Covid vaccination centres, according to Le Monde.

Competitors have emerged – including Maija, Allodocteur and Vitodoc – but Doctolib’s rapid development and its continuing position as a near monopoly in the online medical appointments field raises some difficult questions.

“Healthcare is a sensitive area of the economy because of the personal data recorded; and storing this data safely is an essential public service,” said Frédéric Bizard, an economist specialised in public health, to FRANCE 24.

Doctor and patient associations raised some of the issues relating to Doctolib at France’s highest court for administrative law, the Council of State, in March. They argued that because Doctolib was storing patient data on Amazon Web Services – the cloud computing arm of the US behemoth – then Amazon, as a US company, would be required to comply with any demands for information made by US intelligence agencies.

The court ruled in Doctolib’s favour, saying that “safeguards” were already in place in case US authorities request French patient data from Amazon. Doctolib also noted that it encrypts its data.

But an investigation by France Inter radio in March found that Doctolib’s data was not encrypted once it arrived in the Amazon Web Services cloud. Moreover, Doctolib’s German branch found itself embroiled in controversy over data usage in June, when media outlets accused it of sending information about local users to Facebook and the Internet marketing company Outbrain. Information on searches people performed on the Doctolib site had been sold to the two firms along with their IP addresses.

Doctolib immediately back-pedaled, deleting those cookies from its German version and promising never to sell such data again.

“Above all, Doctolib is a private company whose aim is to make money and to expand quickly; the French government mustn’t forget that,” said Bizard.

The government had left a gap in public services that was then exploited by Doctolib, Bizard said, adding that the company’s runaway success was due to France’s own “failure to digitise the state health system”.

“The UK and Spain don’t need an equivalent of Doctolib because they have succesfully digitised (the health sector),” Bizard said. “The UK put £3 billion into digitisation a decade ago whereas France invested a mere €150 millon back in 2005.”

French doctors are also reluctant to use the digital tools offered by the state social security system, Bizard said. They are much more willing to use Doctolib because it “offers them assistance to make the technology very easy for them to use”.

Doctolib’s popularity has soared with doctors as well as patients as a result, with the number of healthcare professionals registered on the site quadrupling from 75,000 to 300,000 over the past two years.

This article was translated from the original in French.

Guadeloupe protesters seize legislature in standoff with Paris


Protesters first entered the debating chamber of the regional council while it was meeting on Thursday (AFP/Benedicte JOURDIER)

Amandine Ascencio with Cecile Azzaro
Fri, December 24, 2021

Protesters in Guadeloupe on Friday occupied the local legislature in the French Caribbean overseas territory, in a new flare-up of a standoff with Paris sparked by Covid rules.

There have been tensions in Guadeloupe and the neighbouring island French territory of Martinique during the last weeks over rules including obligatory Covid vaccinations for healthworkers that have fed into long-standing local grievances.

Protesters first entered the debating chamber of the regional council while it was meeting on Thursday with several staying the night and deciding to continue their action into Friday. Councillors were able to leave peacefully.

They want to negotiate with Paris over the crisis, but officials have so far indicated that there can be no talks as long as such actions are carried out. The protesters notably want all sanctions halted against healthworkers who have refused the Covid jab.

With Christmas looming the protesters began to leave the chamber at 1:00 pm (1700 GMT) but would meet again Monday to prepare a new action next week, Elie Domota, a union leader and chief of the LKP association told AFP.

"We're here and as long as we don't have a commitment, because we have nothing at all, we have absolutely nothing, so as long as we don't have a firm commitment, an urgent meeting, we'll stay here," said Maite Hubert M'toumo, general secretary of the general union of Guadeloupean workers, said earlier in the legislature.

Raphael Cece, of the newspaper Rebelle, added: "We are not against the vaccine, but we are fighting against this injustice, the sanctions, the mandatory vaccines for healthworkers."

France's Overseas Territories Minister Sebastien Lecornu lashed out at their action, tweeting: "No demand justifies hindering the smooth running of an assembly of elected officials in the middle of a plenary session."

Covid vaccination rates in France's Caribbean territories are far lower than those in mainland France, and there are concerns that the new wave created by the fast-spreading Omicron variant could spark serious problems.

The crisis brought the island to a standstill last month when protesters set up barricades around major roads.

Healthworkers who did not want to be vaccinated will be suspended from December 31 but can be helped to transition into other work.

France's Caribbean territories, remnants of the colonial era, are seen as luxury holiday destinations by people in mainland France. But residents there believe they have long suffered from neglect by Paris, which has resulted in living standards well below the French average.

asa-caz-sjw/yad

RUSSIAN WHITE NATIONALISTS
Russian mercenaries deploy to eastern Ukraine - sources


Borodai the Prime Minister of the self proclaimed 'Donetsk People's Republic' 

attends a news conference in Donetsk

Thu, December 23, 2021
By Maria Tsvetkova and Anton Zverev

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian mercenaries have deployed to separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine in recent weeks to bolster defences against Ukrainian government forces as tensions between Moscow and the West rise, four sources have told Reuters.

In recent weeks, Russia has moved tens of thousands of regular troops to staging posts closer to Ukraine and followed up by demanding urgent security guarantees from the West designed, Moscow says, to prevent Ukraine and other neighbouring countries being used as a base to attack it.

The West and Ukraine have for their part accused Russia of weighing a fresh attack on its southern neighbour as soon as next month, something Moscow denies.

Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine in 2014 and backed pro-Russian separatists who seized a swathe of the industrial Donbass region of eastern Ukraine that same year, and continue to fight Ukrainian government forces there.

Of four sources, three described their offers from mercenary recruiters to go to Donbass. They said the recruiters did not disclose who they represented. All four sources declined to be named, citing fears for their safety.

Two of the three sources said they had accepted; the third said he had refused.

"There is a full house. They are gathering everybody with combat experience," said one of the two who accepted.

He said he had previously fought in Ukraine and Syria for groups of Russian security contractors whose operations have been closely aligned with Russia's strategic interests. He declined to identify the contractors.

The fighter said he was planning to join up with fellow mercenaries on the Russian side of the border with the separatist-held Luhansk region in eastern Ukraine.

The Kremlin says it has nothing to do with private Russian military contractors whose operatives it describes as volunteers with no connection to the state.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said: "It's the first we've heard of this and we don't know how reliable these assertions are."

Peskov said there were no Russian regular forces or military advisers in eastern Ukraine and never had been, and that Moscow was not considering sending any. Kyiv disputes that and says regular Russian army forces are present.

SPECIAL TRAINING

Alexander Ivanov, head of the Community of Officers For International Security, a non-governmental group representing Russian contractors in the Central African Republic, said he had "not a single confirmation" that any Russian mercenary had been deployed to Ukraine.

Three of the sources said they were not aware of any plans for a new Russian attack on Ukraine or of preparations that would suggest one was coming.

One of the sources, a contractor who has taken part in Russian operations abroad and had already arrived in eastern Ukraine, said the deployment was for defensive purposes. The first mercenary said the same.

Another source said he was not directly involved in the deployment, but was in touch with people on the ground who were undergoing special training. He said the aim of the deployment was what he called sabotage activities to undermine stability in Ukraine.

The Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) proclaimed its independence from Ukraine in 2014 after separatist fighters took control of a slice of eastern Ukraine. Backed by Russia, its self-proclaimed status has not been recognised internationally. Alexander Borodai, ex-prime minister of the DPR and head of the Union of Donbass Volunteers, said his organisation was not involved in the recruitment of any mercenaries for eastern Ukraine.

Members of his organisation have previously fought in Ukraine and Syria.

"If and when it's needed, we'll call people - but there has been no call for now," said Borodai, who is also a lawmaker for Russia's ruling party, United Russia.

Separatist spokesperson Eduard Basurin said he knew nothing of any recent Russian deployments of security contractors to eastern Ukraine.

Ukraine's military intelligence service declined to comment, while the state security service did not reply to a request for comment.

(Reporting by Maria Tsvetkova and Anton Zverev, additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk in Kyiv; Editing by Andrew Osborn, Kevin Liffey and Jon Boyle)

World's oldest family tree created using DNA

Paul Rincon - Science editor, BBC News website
Thu, December 23, 2021,

Scientists have compiled the world's oldest family tree from human bones interred at a 5,700-year-old tomb in the Cotswolds, UK.

Analysis of DNA from the tomb's occupants revealed the people buried there were from five continuous generations of one extended family.

Most of those found in the tomb were descended from four women who all had children with the same man.

The right to use the site was based on descent from one man.

But people were buried in different parts of the tomb based on the first-generation matriarch they were descended from.

This suggests that the first-generation women held a socially significant place in the memories of this community. The Neolithic tomb, or "cairn", at Hazleton North in Gloucestershire has two L-shaped chambers, one facing north and the other south.

Co-author Prof David Reich, from Harvard Medical School in Boston, US, who led the generation of ancient DNA from the remains, explained: "Two of the women, all of their children are in the south chamber - and their kids up to the fifth generation.

"And then the other two women, their kids are primarily in the north chamber - although some of them switch to the south chamber later in the use life of the tomb - probably reflecting the collapse of the north passage which meant it wasn't possible to bury there anymore."

Dr Chris Fowler of Newcastle University, UK, the first author and lead archaeologist in the study, said: "This is of wider importance because it suggests that the architectural layout of other Neolithic tombs might tell us about how kinship operated at those tombs."

The family tree for burials in Hazleton North cairn

The tomb dates to an important period just after farming was introduced to Britain by people whose ancestors had - several thousand years earlier - spread through Europe from Anatolia (modern Turkey) and the Aegean. The work will help researchers understand family dynamics among these Stone Age people and learn more about their culture.

"Hopefully this will be the first of many such studies," said Prof Reich. "It really makes vivid the lives of these people... who lived in this place a very long time ago."

There are also indications that "stepsons" were adopted into the family, the researchers say - males whose mother was buried in the tomb but not their biological father, and whose mother had also had children with a male related to the original founder.
Missing women

While two female family members who died in childhood were buried in the tomb, the complete absence of adult daughters suggests that their remains were placed either in the tombs of male partners with whom they had children, or elsewhere.

"There are missing women. So the question - because men and women are born at about the same rate - is where they are. It's a mystery - and it's not that they're in the next tomb over because overall the whole community is missing them," said Prof Reich.

"Are people cremated? There are some cremation practices. Are people disposed of in different ways in the landscape or are we seeing only people who achieve a certain social status?"

While the tomb reveals evidence of polygyny - men having children with multiple women - it also shows that polyandry was also widespread: women having children with multiple men.

Different women who had children with one man tended not to be related to one another. But in cases where women procreated with more than one man, those men tended to be close relatives.

Iñigo Olalde, from the University of the Basque Country, Spain, who was the lead geneticist for the study and its co-first author, said: "The excellent DNA preservation at the tomb and the use of the latest technologies in ancient DNA recovery and analysis allowed us to uncover the oldest family tree ever reconstructed and analyse it to understand something profound about the social structure of these ancient groups."

The study is published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature.