According to a report in the UK Independent newspaper published on Saturday, Ahmet Yildiz, an openly gay physics student was shot as he was leaving a cafe near the Bosphorus strait. He tried to flee in his car, but lost control and was pronounced dead at a hospital.

Known as "Turkey's gay poster boy," he had represented his country at an international gay gathering in San Francisco last year. Shortly after coming out this year, Yildiz had reported to the authorities that he had received death threats but they were not investigated. The police are now investigating his murder.

His friend, Sedef Cakmak, was quoted in the paper as saying, "He fell victim to a war between old mentalities and growing civil liberties."

"I feel helpless: we are trying to raise awareness of gay rights in this country, but the more visible we become, the more we open ourselves up to this sort of attack," said Cakmak who is also a member of the gay lobby group Lamda Istanbul. The group, which is the city's largest LGBT association, was ordered by a court to shut down in May this year as its objectives are "against the law and morality."

The paper further quoted a close friend and near neighbour who described Yildiz's relationship with his parents as tumultuous. The family "wanted him to go back home, see a doctor who could cure him, and get married."

"From the day I met him, I never heard Ahmet have a friendly conversation with his parents... They would argue constantly, mostly about where he was, who he was with, what he was doing."

Suggesting that his being openly gay could have been too much for his family to handle, the neighbour said: "He could have hidden who he was, but he wanted to live honestly."

"He was too brave. He was too open."

Friends say they suspect Yildiz's murder to be an honour-related killing as they had been unable to contact his family for funeral arrangements as his body laid in the morgue for three days.

"We've been trying to contact Ahmet's family since Wednesday, to get them to take responsibility for the funeral," one of the victim's friends said. "There's no answer, and I don't think they are going to come."

The refusal of families to bury their relatives is common after honour-related murders.

Mazhar Bagli, a Turkish sociologist told The Independent that although he has not heard of a death revolving around homosexuality, he has no doubt that it could be used as justification. "Honour killings cleanse illicit relationships. For women, that is a broad term. Men are allowed more sexual freedom, but homosexuality is still seen by some as beyond the pale," said the sociologist who had interviewed 189 people convicted of honour killings.

The Human Rights Watch defines an "honour killing" as the murder of a person, usually a woman, suspected of having offended the "honour" of her family or community, generally on the basis of sexual behaviour deemed transgressive - for example, engaging in a sexual relationship outside of heterosexual marriage.

In Turkey - a predominantly Muslim but officially secular country - a recent government study estimated that around 1,000 honour killings have been committed in the past five years. The UN estimates that 5,000 honour killings take place globally every year, from Brazil to Pakistan to Britain.