A woman has confessed to strangling her daughter to death at the behest of her husband and brother-in-law in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's Shangla district, police said Friday.

Addressing a news conference, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Alpuri Mohammad Riaz Khan said 12-year-old Gul Naz had been murdered on Wednesday night. After her death, the girl's mother, Naseeb Ranra, had filed a complaint and accused her husband Noor Muhammad and brother-in-law Sher Muhammad of killing her.

Police had, however, taken Ranra into custody suspecting her involvement in the murder. During interrogation, she confessed that she herself killed her daughter by strangling her at night, the DSP said.

He said the victim's mother claimed that she killed her daughter at the behest of her husband and brother-in-law. Ranra was quoted as saying that her daughter had a month earlier complained to the police that her father used to beat her up and even cut her hair at times. Police had then arrested the girl's father in a case filed under Section 107 of Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) but he was later released on bail.

After securing bail, the girl's father went to Darra Adam Khel and later called Ranra and asked her to kill their daughter Gul Naz before he returned, the DSP quoted the accused woman as saying.

The woman also claimed that her husband and brother-in-law had threatened to kill her if she did not kill the girl. Fearing this, the woman said she strangled her daughter to death while she was sleeping in her room.

The police official said cases have been registered against the three accused under Sections 302 and 109 of the Pakistan Penal Code in Alpuri Police Station. Ranra's husband and brother-in-law have also been taken into custody.

The accused woman was produced in a local court where she confessed to killing her daughter, the DSP said.