Indonesia on Wednesday confirmed its first deaths from bird flu, saying tests on a father and his two young daughters who died recently showed they had the virus, a minister said on Wednesday.

"Test results from a Hong Kong laboratory which I received this morning confirmed they were positive for the H5N1 virus," Health Minister Siti Fadillah Supari told reporters.

Asked if the three died from bird flu, Supari said: "Yes."

"It is not yet known how they got infected, but we continue to conduct an investigation on the ground," she said.

"The results show (the virus is) a conventional one, and not a new virus. Therefore, there is no need to worry about human-to-human transmission."

Authorities have taken samples of more than 300 people who had contact with the family on the outskirts of Jakarta.

They also plan to carry out extensive tests on animals within a 20-km (12-mile) radius of the family's house and slaughter those infected.

The bird flu virus, which arrived in Asia in late 2003, has previously killed 40 people in Vietnam, half of them since December, 12 in Thailand and four Cambodians.

Health authorities fear the virus will mutate and become easily passed between humans, causing a global pandemic.

Last month, Indonesia reported its first human case in a poultry worker, but the man did not develop symptoms and is healthy.

PHOTO CAPTION

Dead chickens suspected of being infected by the bird flu virus lay at a poultry farm in Sukabumi, West Java July 20, 2005. (Reuters)