The birds, southeast Asian mesias, died last month of the highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 strain, the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) said.

"Only the mesias were infected with H5N1 and 53 out of 101 birds died," it said in a statement.

The department also said it was not possible to know if a parrot from Surinam, which also died, had in fact been killed by the same virus, as the tissues of the two species were pooled during testing.

"Infection with H5N1 was transmitted between the mesias, but there is no evidence of transmission to other species in the facility," a quarantine center in Essex, it said.

"The original identification of HPAI H5N1 on October 21 was made from a pool of tissues derived from a Pionus parrot (Surinam) and a mesia (Taiwan)," the department said.

"It has not been possible to say whether the virus isolated came from the parrot tissue or the mesia tissue or both. However, in the light of the other evidence the balance of probabilities is that the source was the mesia sample."

Local environment minister Ben Bradshaw said "it was an innocent mixup" when interviewed on BBC television.

Bradshwaw meanwhile denied a newspaper report that any of the infected birds had escaped.

"There is no evidence following an exhaustive investigation... that any birds were either released or left out of this quarantine early," Bradshaw told BBC television.

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