Police in Menghai county, Yunnan province, confirmed on Tuesday a female college student from Nanjing of Jiangsu province, who had been reported missing for 24 days as of Monday, was killed by her boyfriend and two other accomplices.

The student, Li Qianyue, was lured by the two friends of her boyfriend into going to a forest in the county's suburb on July 9 before she was killed and buried at the site. Her boyfriend and his two friends made the plan before she traveled to Menghai, according to local police.

Li, born in 1998, graduated from Jiangsu Vocational Institute of Commerce in Nanjing in June. She went to Kunming from Nanjing by plane on the morning of July 9 and arrived in Xishuangbanna Dai autonomous prefecture at 7 pm. There was no trace of her after her last image was caught by surveillance cameras at an inspection station of Menghai county later that day.

Her boyfriend, surnamed Hong, said he could not get in touch with Li on July 10. He watched surveillance videos of Nanjing's Maqun community, in which he and Li lived together, before telling others he noticed his girlfriend had left home the day before.

He said Li had not replied to any of his messages on social media since July 9.

Li's father reported the disappearance to Nanjing police on July 13.

After receiving a message from Nanjing police, Menghai police started to search for Li immediately. They became suspicious during the investigation and formed a task force to investigate the case.

They worked with Nanjing police to arrest the three suspects on Monday in Nanjing, and unearthed Li's body in the forest in Menghai on the same day.

The case is still under investigation.