Hanoi - Prosecutors will ask for the death sentence for a college student who confessed to slitting her wealthy ex-boyfriend's throat with a fruit knife on Valentine's Day, state media reported Thursday.

The Hanoi People's Procuracy filed murder charges Wednesday against the student, 22-year-old Vu Kim Anh, and requested the maximum penalty of death, the state-run newspaper Lao Dong reported. The trial is due to begin next month.

Anh, a fourth-year student at Hanoi Pedagogical University, confessed to murdering Nguyen Tien Chinh, 42, in the early hours of February 14 as the two sat in his parked Lexus sports utility vehicle on a Hanoi street.

When the case broke in February, many Vietnamese sympathized with Anh, who said she had killed Chinh in self-defence after he tried to rape her.

Chinh, the chief executive of a mining company, had reportedly hidden the fact from Anh that he was married during their affair, which began in April 2006. Anh broke it off after discovering Chinh had a wife.

Chinh reportedly persuaded Anh to meet him February 13 by threatening to tell her fiance about their affair.

Police said Anh used a fruit knife she found in the car to slit Chinh's throat and fled to her fiance's house, where police arrested her a week later. (dpa)