A popular female Pakistani singer who defied the Taliban's decree against singing and dancing has been shot and killed in northwest Pakistan

Authorities described the singer's ex-husband as a suspect in the case. Ghazala Javed, who recorded scores of songs in her native Pashto language and became a household name among young, progressive ethnic Pashtuns in northwest Pakistan, had just left a beauty salon and was driving home with her father when gunmen on a motorcycle raced towards their car and sprayed it with bullets. Javed was hit with six bullets and pronounced dead at a hospital in Peshawar, the capital of Pakistan's Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, according to hospital official Rahim Afridi. Javed's father also was killed, police said. In recent years the rise of the Pakistani Taliban in the region and the group's ban against singing and dancing made it difficult for Javed and other musical artists to perform and record songs in Pakistan. Javed recorded and taped many of her latest songs and music videos in nearby Dubai. In 2011, Javed made headlines when she asked for a divorce from her husband after she found out that he had at least one other wife. It was a rare decision in a deeply Islamic and male-dominated society where many view a woman's demand for a divorce as a dishonor to the husband. Shortly after the shooting police released a statement saying Javed's sister had accused her ex-husband and two of his acquaintances Investigators said a search was underway for the three men.