2 Transgender Women Stabbed to Death at Home in Northwest Pakistan

Two men armed with daggers killed two transgender women at their home in conservative northwest Pakistan overnight before fleeing the scene, police said, a sign of increasing violence against trans people in the country.

The killings happened Sunday night in Mardan, a city in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, local police chief Fahim Khan said. He said the motive behind the murders was unclear and officers are still investigating.

Transgender people are often subjected to harassment, abuse and attacks in Muslim-majority Pakistan. They are also among the victims of so-called honor killings carried out by relatives to punish perceived sexual transgressions.

Farzana Jan, President of the Trans Action rights group in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, said another nine trans people have been killed in gun attacks in the province since January.

She said none of the attackers involved in the previous cases had been brought to justice, mainly because families pardoned the attackers or prosecutors did not pursue the cases seriously.

The transgender community has threated to protest if the attackers are not arrested.

"We have given a three-day deadline to the police for arresting those behind the latest killings in Mardan," Jan said. "We will stage rallies if the killers of two members of our community are not arrested," she said.

There are no exact figures about the number of trans people in Pakistan, but Jan estimated that about 75,000 live in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Mardan is located about 50 kilometers (30 miles) east of Peshawar.