Re: North Korea Denies Bird Flu Outbreak - June 2008
<TABLE class=ap-story-table style="veritcal-align: :top" border=0><TBODY><TR class=ap-story-tr><TD class=ap-story-td>Jun 19, 8:21 AM EDT
North Korea denies outbreak of bird flu
</TD></TR><TR><TD>SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea strongly denied Thursday that bird flu had recently broken out in the country, contradicting a report from an outside aid group.
The Seoul-based Good Friends organization said last week that the disease had been discovered in the communist nation's northeast on June 3, when several birds were found dead near a military base.
The group also said dozens of magpies were found dead inside a camp for political prisoners in an adjacent province, and a child of one prison official subsequently suffered a high fever and died, although the cause of the deaths was unclear.
The North's official Korean Central News Agency said the country's quarantine authorities found in an investigation that no bird or human had died in the region and that health conditions there were "very safe."
"There is no reason for us to conceal bird flu," KCNA said.
It also said the country was maintaining tight preventive measures against bird flu, including the operation of about 1,600 observatory posts for migratory birds, considered a main transmitter of the disease.
The last confirmed case of bird flu in North Korea was reported in 2005.
Good Friends, a Buddhist-affiliated aid group, sends food and other assistance to North Korea and regularly issues reports on what is happening inside the reclusive nation. The group has previously provided information on North Korea that has proven correct but does not disclose its sources, out of fear they could face retribution.
North Korea is one of the world's most closed nations and it is essentially impossible to independently confirm many developments there.
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
<TABLE class=ap-story-table style="veritcal-align: :top" border=0><TBODY><TR class=ap-story-tr><TD class=ap-story-td>Jun 19, 8:21 AM EDT
North Korea denies outbreak of bird flu
</TD></TR><TR><TD>SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea strongly denied Thursday that bird flu had recently broken out in the country, contradicting a report from an outside aid group.
The Seoul-based Good Friends organization said last week that the disease had been discovered in the communist nation's northeast on June 3, when several birds were found dead near a military base.
The group also said dozens of magpies were found dead inside a camp for political prisoners in an adjacent province, and a child of one prison official subsequently suffered a high fever and died, although the cause of the deaths was unclear.
The North's official Korean Central News Agency said the country's quarantine authorities found in an investigation that no bird or human had died in the region and that health conditions there were "very safe."
"There is no reason for us to conceal bird flu," KCNA said.
It also said the country was maintaining tight preventive measures against bird flu, including the operation of about 1,600 observatory posts for migratory birds, considered a main transmitter of the disease.
The last confirmed case of bird flu in North Korea was reported in 2005.
Good Friends, a Buddhist-affiliated aid group, sends food and other assistance to North Korea and regularly issues reports on what is happening inside the reclusive nation. The group has previously provided information on North Korea that has proven correct but does not disclose its sources, out of fear they could face retribution.
North Korea is one of the world's most closed nations and it is essentially impossible to independently confirm many developments there.
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
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