Traces of horse have been found in meatballs labeled as beef and pork for Swedish global furniture giant Ikea, according to authorities in the Czech Republic.

The horse meat was found in one-kilogram packs of frozen meat balls made in Sweden and shipped to the Czech Republic for sale in Ikea stores there, the Czech State Veterinary Administration said.

It is the latest discovery in a deepening scandal over the discovery of horse meat in ready meals sold as beef in supermarkets in Ireland, the UK and other European countries.

Markus Schreiber / AP, file

Ikea furniture stores also sell typical Swedish food.

A total of 1,675 pounds of the meatballs were stopped from reaching the shelves.

Ikea's furniture stores feature restaurants and also sell food typical of the company's home country, including the so-called Kottbullar meat balls.

It was not immediately clear whether Ikea exported the same product to other countries. Calls seeking comment from Ikea in Sweden were not immediately returned Monday.

The Czech authority also found horse meat in beef burgers imported from Poland during random tests of food products.

Authorities across Europe have started doing random DNA checks after traces of horse meat turned up in frozen supermarket meals such as burgers and lasagna beginning last month.

The European Union's agriculture ministers gathered in Brussels Monday to discuss the widening scandal's fallout, with some member states pressing for tougher rules to regain consumer confidence.

The 27-nation bloc must agree on binding origin disclosures for food product ingredients, starting with a better labeling of meat products, German agriculture minister Ilse Aigner said.

"Consumers have every right to the greatest-possible transparency," she insisted.

The scandal began in Ireland in mid-January when the country's announced the results of its first-ever DNA tests on beef products. It tested frozen beef burgers taken from store shelves and found that more than a third of brands at five supermarkets contained at least a trace of horse. The sample of one brand sold by British supermarket kingpin Tesco was more than a quarter horse.

Such discoveries have spread like wildfire across Europe as governments, supermarkets, meat traders and processors began their own DNA testing of products labeled beef and have been forced to withdraw tens of millions of products from store shelves.

More than a dozen nations have detected horse flesh in processed products such as factory-made burger patties, lasagnas, meat pies and meat-filled pastas. The investigations have been complicated by elaborate supply chains involving multiple cross-border middlemen. 

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This story was originally published on Mon Feb 25, 2013 6:57 AM EST

Kieran Doherty / Reuters, file

Fast-food chain Burger King has dropped a supplier whose supermarket products were found to contain horse DNA. The restaurant company says its products were not affected.

LONDON — Burger King said on Thursday it had stopped using one of the firms caught up in the scandal of supplying British grocers with hamburger that contained horse meat.

The British food industry has been rocked by the revelation last week that retailers including market leader Tesco and smaller chains Aldi, Lidl and Iceland had sold beef products that contained horse meat.

Food safety experts say horse meat poses no added health risks to consumers, but the discovery has raised concerns about the food supply chain and the ability to trace meat ingredients.

On its website, Burger King said it had decided to replace all Silvercrest products in Britain and Ireland with products from another approved Burger King supplier.

"This is a voluntary and precautionary measure," Burger King said. "We are working diligently to identify suppliers that can produce 100 percent pure Irish and British beef products that meet our high quality standards."

The company said last week it was "confident" its beef supplies had not been affected because its patties are made on a dedicated production line and, unlike products implicated in the horse meat scandal, do not contain meat from continental Europe.

The burger products from the grocers, which were revealed last week to have tested positive for horse DNA, were produced by Liffey Meats and Silvercrest Foods in Ireland and Dalepak Hambleton in Britain.

Tesco, Britain's biggest retailer, immediately withdrew from sale all products from its supplier, Silvercrest. The grocery chain said it was working with authorities and the supplier to urgently understand how horse meat came to be in the product.

ABP Food Group, which owns Silvercrest, said at the time that the source of the contamination was a beef-based product bought from two third-party suppliers outside of Ireland.

The discovery of horse meat could be both embarrassing and damaging for the retailers involved. The mass-selling Sun newspaper carried the Burger King announcement on its front page Thursday with the headline "Shergar King," in reference to a famous racehorse that was kidnapped and never seen again.

Related:

Hamburgers pulled from UK shelves after horse meat discovered

Full food safety coverage from NBC News

Darren Staples / Reuters, file

In 2007, celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay called for British people to start eating horse meat, saying it was healthy and "packed with protein."

LONDON — The idea of eating horse meat has been described as the "last taboo" of English cooking.

So one of Britain's leading supermarkets, Tesco, was doubtless horrified at having to post a statement saying that horse DNA had been found in hamburgers on sale in the U.K. and Ireland.

Tim Smith, Tesco’s group technical director, said the store apologized "sincerely for any distress" caused.

"We immediately withdrew from sale all products from the supplier in question," he stressed. "The presence of illegal meat in our products is extremely serious.  Our customers have the right to expect that food they buy is produced to the highest standards."

The discovery was made by the Food Safety Authority of Ireland, which said it had carried out a study to examine the "authenticity" of several beef burger, beef meal and salami products.

The results were alarming. Ten of the 27 beef burgers tested were found to contain horse DNA, with nine containing only "very low levels."

"In one sample from Tesco, the level of horse DNA indicated that horse meat accounted for approximately 29 percent relative to the beef content," the FSAI said.

Twenty-three of the 27 burgers also tested positive for pig DNA, the FSAI said, and 21 out of 31 "beef meal products" tested were also found to contain pig DNA, but no horse DNA was discovered.

'No clear explanation'
The FSAI said that the beef burgers with horse DNA were produced at two processing plants in Ireland and one in the U.K., and were sold at Tesco and four other outlets, Dunnes Stores, Lidl, Aldi and Iceland.

Alan Reilly, the FSAI’s chief executive, said in a statement "there is no clear explanation at this time for the presence of horse DNA in products emanating from meat plants that do not use horse meat in their production process."

"In Ireland, it is not in our culture to eat horse meat and therefore, we do not expect to find it in a burger," he noted.

"Likewise, for some religious groups or people who abstain from eating pig meat, the presence of traces of pig DNA is unacceptable," he added.

Reilly stressed the products did "not pose any food safety risk and consumers should not be worried."

In 2007, celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay called for British people to start eating horse meat, saying it was healthy and "packed with protein" with a "slightly gamey" flavor, The Telegraph newspaper reported. The idea failed to take off.

In Britain, two consumers largely spoke for the nation when they told ITV News of their shock and horror.

"I'd be fuming if I found out there was horse meat in my burgers -- obviously," one man said.

"It's just not normal," a woman added. "Fine we eat cows and everything, but horse meat? No."

Jessica Stark, director of communications for World Horse Welfare, said that campaign group was concerned about horses in Europe who are driven to be slaughtered in journeys that can last several days. She said WHW did not oppose the eating of horses, but wanted to see journey times restricted to nine to 12 hours.

She said in some countries horses were seen as companions or pets and were "revered," while other nations, such as Italy and France, saw them simply as livestock.

Asked if she had eaten horse, Stark said "Gosh, no, not that I'm aware of." Asked if she would, she replied, "No I would not ... it's a personal choice."

Lee Jae-Won / Reuters

A shopper picks up Australian beef at a Lotte Mart store in Seoul, South Korea, on Wednesday. Lotte Mart was one of two major South Korean retailers to halt sales of U.S. beef.

SEOUL, South Korea -- Two major South Korean retailers suspended sales of U.S. beef Wednesday following the discovery of mad cow disease in a U.S. dairy cow. Reaction elsewhere in Asia was muted with Japan saying there's no reason to restrict imports.

South Korea's No. 2 and No. 3 supermarket chains, Home Plus and Lotte Mart, said they have "temporarily" halted sales of U.S. beef to calm worries among South Koreans.

"We stopped sales from today," said Chung Won-hun, a Lotte Mart spokesman. "Not that there were any quality issues in the meat but because consumers were worried."

South Korea is the world's fourth-largest importer of U.S. beef, buying 107,000 tons of the meat worth $563 million in 2011.

California mad cow 'just a random mutation'

The new case of mad cow disease is the first in the U.S. since 2006. It was discovered in a dairy cow in California, but health authorities said Tuesday the animal was never a threat to the nation's food supply.

Reuters reported that the first U.S. mad cow case, which was identified in 2003, caused a $3 billion drop in exports. It took until 2011 before those exports fully recovered.

Mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, is fatal to cows and can cause a deadly human brain disease in people who eat tainted beef. U.S. authorities said the dead California cow has what scientists call an atypical case of BSE, meaning that a random mutation in the animal rather than infected cattle feed was the cause.

Carcass quarantined
The infected cow, the fourth ever discovered in the U.S., was found as part of an Agriculture Department surveillance program that tests about 40,000 cows a year for the disease.

USDA confirms 4th mad cow case in US

The USDA is still tracing the exact life of the infected animal, and the carcass of the cow is under quarantine and will be destroyed.

The cow was found at a rendering plant, which processes diseased or sick animals into mainly non-edible products for use in things like soap or glue.

Gosia Wozniacka / AP

The latest U.S. mad cow case is centered on the Baker Commodities transfer station in Hanford, Calif.

First discovered in Britain in 1986, the disease has killed more than 150 people and 184,000 cows globally, mainly in Britain and Europe, but strict controls have tempered its spread. The first U.S. case was found in late 2003 in an animal imported from Canada, followed by two more in 2005 and 2006. Two of those cases were also "atypical".

The news spread quickly in South Korea, which imposed a ban on U.S. beef in 2003 along with China and other countries because of mad cow disease concerns. Seoul's resumption of U.S. beef imports in 2008 sparked daily candlelight vigils and street protests for several months as many South Koreans still regarded the meat as a public health risk.

South Korea imports U.S. beef from cows less than 30 months old and there is no direct link between U.S. beef imported into South Korea and the infected animal, the country's agriculture ministry said in a statement. The infected U.S. cow was older than 30 months.

Public concern
But the ministry decided to step up inspections of U.S. beef and request detailed information on the case from the United States — initial measures to appease public concern while avoiding possible trade conflicts.

"We are still reviewing whether we will stop quarantine inspections," Chang Jae-hong, deputy director of the ministry's quarantine policy division, told The Associated Press by telephone.

Halting quarantine inspections would prevent U.S. beef from being delivered to stores as it couldn't clear customs.

At a Home Plus store in southwestern Seoul, some shoppers said they were not worried about U.S. beef as long as officials had said there were no health risks.

But others criticized the U.S. government as "arrogant" and "inconsiderate" in asserting that the discovery of an infected cow would have no impact on its meat exports.

"I won't eat meat from the countries where mad cow disease was found," said Kim Woo-sig, a self employed 47-year-old.

In Japan, officials said the country's import policy was unchanged.

'No need for change'
Japan, the world's third-largest consumer of U.S. beef and veal, restricts its imports of U.S. beef to cows of 20 months or younger.

"There is no need for change," in Japan's import rules, Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura told reporters.

But the latest mad cow case may jeopardize moves to expand American beef sales in Taiwan, where the government recently sparked protests by allowing sales of U.S. beef containing ractopamine, a growth additive.

Taiwan's legislature on Wednesday indefinitely postponed a planned discussion on U.S. beef imports. It is likely the government engineered the delay, fearing that the opposition would stoke sentiment against U.S. beef.

There was no immediate response from China's government. Beijing no longer has an outright ban on U.S. beef but exporters have been unable to overcome continued barriers involving inspection of the meat.

The news comes at a time of booming beef exports, with total shipments reaching a record last year thanks to expanding markets in countries like Russia and Canada, according to Commerce Department data.

But exports to Japan, Mexico and South Korea, which bought more than 80 percent of U.S. beef and veal exports in 2003, have yet to match their earlier peaks, with many of them maintaining certain restrictions that may help temper any fallout.

Mexico, which buys more U.S. beef than any other country, said it has no plans to halt imports and that it would maintain the same regimen of inspections for trade across the border.

Vietnam, which suspended U.S. beef imports between December 2003 and September 2011, also said it had not changed its policy on U.S. beef in response to the latest news.

It has also been a difficult period in the domestic market, with firms still reeling from fallout over a ground beef filler that critics called "pink slime", which was pulled from grocery store shelves and forced one producer to idle several factories and another to file for bankruptcy.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.