Ex-husband '˜admits honour killing' of Bradford woman in Pakistan

Police sources quoted by the BBC confirmed that Choudhry Shakeel, who has been arrested on suspicion of murdering Samia Shahid, 28, has admitted he strangled her with a scarf.

Mrs Shahid died last month while on a trip from Bradford to visit relatives in northern Punjab.

Her family initially said she died from natural causes but her second husband - Syed Mukhtar Kazam - believes she was killed because of her marriage to him.

The News newspaper in Pakistan said earlier this month that a forensic report confirmed that she was murdered.

It said the report “stated clearly that her death had been caused due to suffocation, as she was stopped from breathing”.

The report followed claims from Mr Kazam that a 7.5in (19cm) bruise was found on his wife’s neck. Mr Kazam said he had seen a copy of a post-mortem report.

He married his wife in Leeds in September 2014 after she left her first husband, who was a cousin from Pakistan.

Mr Kazam said his wife moved to live with him in Dubai last year but had made trips to the UK to talk to her parents about the relationship.

He said she went to Pakistan on July 14 as a member of her family was ill.

Mr Kazam said his wife had been healthy and he did not believe her family’s initial claims that she died naturally.

The BBC said Mrs Shahid’s father Mohammad, is now being held as an accessory to murder.

Both men appeared in court in Pakistan on Saturday.