A deadly bird flu virus, which has killed 29 Asians this year, has reappeared in Cambodia and the government is deeply worried because villagers ate birds that had died of it, officials said yestersday.

People in this village just outside the capital Phnom Penh, including the owner of a farm where 5,000 chickens died in two days, said they took dead birds, cooked and ate them. Experts say eating chicken that died of the bird flu is safe, provided it is cooked to an internal temperature of at least 70 degrees Celsius (158 Fahrenheit).

All those who have died of the H5N1 virus, which has also recurred in Thailand, Vietnam and China in recent weeks as well as striking in Malaysia for the first time, were infected by the virus from handling birds that had died of it. “I am very worried the return of the bird flu disease could spread to humans as Cambodia's poor people still do not understand the danger”, Agriculture Minister Chan Sarun told Reuters.

Scientists confirmed on Tuesday that the H5N1 virus, which has killed 20 Vietnamese and nine Thais since it spread rapidly across much of Asia early this year, had killed the chickens at the farm of villager Hun Neary, Chan Sarun said.

Yesterday, workers in protective clothing dug deep pits to bury the carcasses and sprayed the farm. But some villagers had already carried away dead birds. “My whole family ate it last night, but now I am afraid of being sick”, said Hun Neary's 33-year-old neighbour, Poun Sophea.

Officials were scouring the area for dead chickens taken from the farm and confiscating them for burial.

They were explaining the dangers of handling the carcasses in a country where an estimated 36 percent of the 13 million people live on less than $1 a day. This year, Cambodia culled several thousand poultry when the bird flu virus struck in five of its 24 provinces.