(AFP) The government has temporarily banned all beef imports from Japan after a suspected case of mad cow disease was discovered there, a health ministry spokesman said today.

A temporary ban on all beef products, including fresh meat and processed foods, from Japan has been imposed as a precautionary measure, said Wong Yoon Teai, press secretary to Health Minister Chua Jui Meng.

"The ban would help put beef consumers at ease," Wong told AFP , adding that Malaysia currently only imports beef from Australia, India and the United States.

The case was reported in the Chiba area east of Tokyo on Monday, where a five-year-old dairy cow tested positive for mad cow disease, a brain-wasting illness linked to the fatal variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans.