The modified PCR protocol (PAR primers) resulted in a 10fold increase of sensitivity compared to the published protocol which was applied as a two-step PCR (Figure 1 ). With this optimization, three out of 120 pooled samples were PCR positive for paramyxoviruses using PAR primers ( Table 2 ). The identified viruses were termed after the infected bat species: BatPV/ Myo.mys/E20/09 (Accession number JN086950), BatPV/Pip.pip/E95/09 (Accession number JN086951), and BatPV/Nyc.noc/E155/09 (Accession number JN086952). Fragments of 529 bp length were aligned with homologous fragments of the partial polymerase gene of other members of the family Paramyxoviridae from GenBank ( Figure 2 ). Phylogenetic analysis confirmed three distinct isolates within the subfamily Paramyxovirinae. BatPV/Nyc.noc/E155/09 was in basal association to other members of the genus Rubulavirus. For both BatPV/ Myo.mys/E20/09 and BatPV/Pip.pip/E95/09, the closest association was observed to J-virus and Beilong virus (unclassified viruses) [28, 29] . A longer sequence of 1,593 bp was generated for BatPV/Pip.pip/E95/09 and used for an extended phylogenetic analysis ( Figure 3 ). The highest similarity was revealed for BatPV/Myo.mys/E20/09 to J-Virus with 66.4%, for BatPV/ Pip.pip/E95/09 also to J-Virus with 64.1%, and for BatPV/ Nyc.noc/E155/09 to Rubulavirus with 62.1% (Table 3) . Within the subfamily Paramyxovirinae the extent of minimal nucleotide homology for the partial polymerase gene between different viruses in the same genus ranges from 64.1% (Rubulavirus) to 76.8% (Henipavirus), whereas the extent of nucleotide similarity between viruses from different genera is between 40.3% (Morbillivirus) and 58.1% (Henipavirus). Analysing the nucleotide homology of the partial polymerase gene of the new insectivorous bat paramyxoviruses, no definite correlation to one of the other paramyxovirus genera could be obtained. The comparison of sequences of BatPV/Myo.mys/E20/09 (Accession number JN086953) and BatPV/Pip.pip/E95/09 (Accession number JN086954), obtained from the PCR assay with RES-MOR-HEN primers (Table 2) , confirmed the results of the above-mentioned phylogenetic analysis (data not shown).