SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea on Saturday reported asuspected outbreak of the H5 strain of bird flu at a farm inthe southwest of the country, near another farm thatauthorities said earlier this week had an outbreak of thedeadly H5N1 strain.

The farm ministry said the latest outbreak took place at aduck farm and it has yet to confirm if it is also the H5N1strain. It expects to finish testing on Monday.

Workers on Saturday will cull about 6,500 ducks at the farmthat was raising about 12,500 ducks in Jeongeup, which is 27 km(17 miles) from the farm that had the H5N1 outbreak, theministry said.

On Thursday, the country confirmed the first outbreak ofhighly virulent bird flu in 13 months at a farm in Gimje, about215 km (135 miles) south of Seoul, and started culling over300,000 chickens and other poultry.

The ministry also banned distribution of 3.6 millionanimals within a 10 km radius of the Gimje outbreak site andthe destruction of eggs produced, and already distributed, inthe area.

The country has had seven outbreaks of the deadly H5N1strain of bird flu between November 2006 and March 2007 and hasspent 58.2 billion won ($59.17 million) on quarantine measures.

Bird flu has killed 238 people globally since 2003,according to the World Health Organisation.

It largely remains an animal disease, but the big concernis that it could mutate into a disease that easily passes fromone person to another, triggering a deadly global pandemic.

(Reporting by Kim Yeon-hee; Editing by Jon Herskovitz)