14 February 2004	Saturday	22 Zilhaj 1424

BANGKOK, Feb 13: The United Nations issued a sharp warning on Friday to Asian countries not to relax in the war on a bird flu virus that has killed 19 people in the region because the epidemic was still spreading.

"The spread of the avian influenza virus in several Asian countries is still not under control," the Food and Agricultural Organization said in a statement, and governments had "to remain vigilant as further outbreaks continue to occur".

Cambodia, China, Indonesia and Laos had reported new outbreaks of the H5N1 virus, it said, despite the slaughter of 80 million chickens - most of them in worst-hit Vietnam and Thailand, which had each killed 30 million.

China confirmed outbreaks of bird flu in Shanghai, its financial centre, and in the northern city of Tianjin, near Beijing. It also confirmed six outbreaks in the southwestern province of Yunnan and Guangdong, in the south, as well as saying a black swan had died at a zoo in Shenzhen, bordering Hong Kong, of the H5N1 virus.

China has now confirmed cases in 14 provinces. The FAO also stressed that poorer Asian countries had neither the resources nor the organization to eradicate the fast spreading H5N1 virus, reflecting the fears of experts that it could flare up again easily.

India said on Friday it would host an emergency summit of senior health and agricultural officials from seven South Asian nations on Monday to discuss joint measures to tackle the epidemic.

The World Bank said on Friday it would lend Hanoi 10 million dollars to compensate farmers in Vietnam, where about 30 million of an estimated 250 million poultry have been killed by the virus or culled. -Reuters