Residents halt Djibouti bird flu chicken slaughter

DJIBOUTI, May 17 (Reuters) - Djibouti, which has confirmed the first human bird flu case in sub-Saharan Africa, has halted slaughtering poultry after residents refused to cooperate unless they received immediate compensation, an official said.

Vets assisted by police in the Red Sea country of 300,000, slaughtered 26 chickens this week in the village of Bahour, the area near the Somali border where a two-year old girl tested positive for the deadly H5N1 avian influenza virus.

But when they arrived in another area nearby, angry villagers refused to hand over their chickens.

''The residents did not want to cooperate because the government cannot answer their call to be compensated immediately,'' Moussa Ibrahim, head of livestock at the agriculture ministry, told Reuters yesterday.

Officials were meeting today to discuss their nextmove, with the intention to re-start slaughtering domestic chickens soon.

The infected girl was said to be in a stable condition.

Three of her siblings have also had tests for possible infections.

''She is in good health. She does not have a temperature or a cough, she has nothing,'' the girl's father Abdi Ali Robleh, told Reuters. ''We are waiting to hear whether we can go home.'' Djibouti says more than 4.4 million dollar will be needed to fight the spread of the virus and has appealed to the international community for help.

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