France has detected a case of the highly contagious H5N8 strain of bird flu on a duck farm in the southwest, the agriculture ministry said on Friday.

The outbreak, which killed 2,000 out of a flock of 5,000 ducks on the farm in the Tarn region, follows a case of H5N8 confirmed among wild birds in northern France this week and is the latest of a series of outbreaks in Europe.