The World Health Organization reported Saturday that the strain had probably been spread to the region by migrating birds.
The teenagers, a 15-year-old girl and her 14-year-old brother, were definitely infected with the virus, according to results released from a British laboratory Saturday.They were still trying to attain results on an 11-year-old sister of the teenagers who died Friday.
The WHO sent experts to the region Sunday to determine whether or not the virus had spread to the children from animals or other humans in the area. They were traveling to Van, which borders Iran, close to the village where the children had died, reports AP.
In an attempt to keep the virus from entering the country, Iran restricted movement along its border.
AP also reports that there have been two other possible cases - one of which was confirmed Saturday - of children in Turkey infected with H5N1.
Cheng says that officials in Turkey are in the process of testing about 30 patients - most of them children - for bird flu.
The spread of the disease from East Asia, where it has killed more than 70 people, was "a concern," but the global risk assessment of a human pandemic was unchanged, she told AP.
Since January 2004, more than 140 human cases of the avian flu have been confirmed, mostly in provinces in East Asia.
