ROME - Italian police brought three people in for questioning on Tuesday over the brutal murder of an English student in the university town of Perugia last week, including the girl's American flatmate.

Meredith Kercher, 21, was found in her bedroom on Friday -- which was locked from the inside -- hidden under a duvet and semi-naked with a deep cut to the throat.

The murder has resonated around Europe where thousands of young people take a year away from their home university to study abroad under the Erasmus exchange scheme. Her parents were due to arrive in Perugia, central Italy, later on Tuesday.

Police questioned Kercher's female flatmate -- a 20-year-old American who is studying Italian at Perugia -- as well as two men: the American's 24-year-old Italian student boyfriend and a 37-year-old Congolese man who runs a shop in the town, police chief Arturo De Felice told Reuters by telephone.

Interior Minister Giuliano Amato told a news conference: "It's an ugly story in which people which this girl had in her home, friends, tried to force her into relations which she didn't want."

The three have not been charged or formally arrested.

Although an autopsy found no evidence of rape, De Felice said there were reasons to suspect a sexual assault. "A sexual motive is probable," he said.

Kercher was in her third year at Leeds University.