NEW DELHI, July 25 (Reuters) - India declared a fresh outbreak of avian influenza among poultry, the first this year, but a senior official said on Wednesday authorities were yet to confirm if it was the highly pathogenic H5N1 strain.

"We have avian influenza," Upma Chawdhry, joint secretary of the federal Animal Husbandry Department, told Reuters.

The outbreak was located in a small farm in remote Manipur state in the country's northeast where 133 chickens out of 144 suddenly died this month, Chawdhry said.

"The state government has been informed and asked to start the control and containment operations," she said.

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