Berlin -- A 20-year-old Turkish man who strangled his twin sister after learning she had had an abortion has been remanded in custody, German police said Thursday.

The man drove his sister -- named as Gulsum Semin -- to a remote location in the western German state of Nordrhein-Westfalen and, with the help of a 32-year-old accomplice, strangled her with a clothes line, police said in a statement.

He then smashed her in the face with branches and sticks. The victim later died of her injuries.

The man covered his sister's body with leaves after first removing her wallet to make it look like a robbery.

The pair's father has also been remanded in custody as an accessory to the murder, a charge he denies.

Both the victim and the accused have a triplet sibling, whom the father kept locked out of the family house while the brother collected Gulsum to carry out the so-called "honour killing."

AFP/Expatica