Baghdad, Iraq ? The U.N.’s health agency confirmed Thursday that an Iraqi girl who died earlier this month had succumbed to the virulent H5N1 bird flu virus.

World Health Organization spokesman Dick Thompson said samples taken from the 15-year-old girl from northern Iraq who died Jan. 17 tested positive for the strain, confirming findings announced earlier by a U.S. Navy laboratory.

Thompson said the WHO had been working for the past few days on the assumption that it was a confirmed H5N1 case, and is preparing to send an emergency assessment team to northern Iraq to investigate reports of further possible bird flu cases.

Iraqi authorities have culled more than 500,000 birds in and around the northern Kurdistan town of Raniya where the girl had lived.

The girl’s uncle also died after suffering respiratory complications on Jan. 27 and samples are being sent to the WHO lab in London for testing.

Migratory birds from Turkey pass by Raniya toward the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, which they follow to Iraq’s southern marshlands, before moving on to Kuwait and then South Africa.

In Indonesia, health officials said Thursday they suspect a 15-year-old boy who died after coming into contact with dead chickens had contracted the bird flu strain, but they’re awaiting confirmation from WHO.

If the tests come back positive, the boy – who died Wednesday in the city of Bandung – will be Indonesia’s 15th confirmed victim.

Health officials also are awaiting WHO confirmation for a 22-year-old market vendor who died last week after coming into contact with sick poultry.