Chickens at a poultry farm in Japan" s southwestern prefecture of Kagoshima have tested positive for the highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu, local government officials said Wednesday.

Chickens at a poultry farm in Japan" s southwestern prefecture of Kagoshima have tested positive for the highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu, local government officials said Wednesday.

The prefectural government said that of the 10 birds tested for the virus, eight of them tested positive. The culling of around 8,600 chickens has already started at the poultry farm in Izumi, Kagoshima Prefecture, according to the officials.

This is the third case this year and the fourth since December that mass poultry culling has occurred in Japan following the detection of the avian flu virus, which officials say in some cases was a particularly infective strain.

Earlier this week, two farms were found to have infected chickens in neighboring Miyazaki Prefecture, the nation"s largest poultry-producing region, and the problem was deemed serious enough to dispatch a 170-member Self-Defense Force team to help cull the birds.

A farm in Shimane Prefecture, southeastern Japan, was the scene of the first case of bird flu this season. The subsequent spread of the virus is being called a pandemic by some veterinary experts.

The Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry will send its secretary Kenko Matsuki and a team of specialists to Kagoshima Prefecture to try to locate the exact route of the infection, according to statements by ministry officials earlier.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan also said early on Wednesday that both local and central governments will do their utmost to stamp out the latest outbreak of the virus.