AN uncle accused of the "honour killing" of his 15-year-old niece has told a jury she was "like my daughter".

Tulay Goren is alleged to have been murdered by her father Mehmet and his brothers Ali and Cuma because she fell in love with the wrong man.

The schoolgirl from Woodford Green went missing in January 1999 and her body has never been found, Old Bailey jurors have been told.

Giving evidence in his defence, father-of-five Ali Goren, of Brettenham Road, Walthamstow, was asked what his relationship with his niece was like.

"Very well, like my daughter. I liked her," replied Ali, who was speaking through a Turkish interpreter.

The court has been told that a relationship between Tulay and her boyfriend Halil Unal would have been unacceptable because he was a Sunni Muslim while the Goren family was from the Alevi branch of the faith.

But Ali, 56, said he had "no trouble" with Sunnis and that his own son had had a Sunni girlfriend since 1998, of which he approved.

His barrister Michael Bromley-Martin QC asked him: "Do you yourself follow any honour code?"

"No," replied Ali.

His relationship with Mehmet, Tulay's father, was "distant", he told the court, and they had rowed over Mehmet's gambling.

Ali denies Tulay's murder.

His brothers Mehmet Goren, 49, of Navestock Crescent, Woodford Green, and Cuma Goren, 42, of Evesham Avenue, Walthamstow, have also pleaded not guilty to the charge.

All three also face a count of conspiracy to murder Tulay's boyfriend Halil Unal between May 1998 and February 1999, which they deny.

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