Mexican police turn blind eye to murders of transgender women, say activists |

On Aug 22, 2016 Reuters published an article of which this is an excerpt.

In May, President Enrique Peña Nieto proposed a constitutional reform to legalize same-sex marriage nationwide.

But advances in LGBT rights have not been accompanied by a decline in homophobic and transphobic attacks.

Mexico has one of the highest rates of transphobic violence in the world, according to a recent report by the Cornell University Law School in New York and the Transgender Law Center, a California-based civil rights organization.

The number of documented murders of transgender people rose to 46 in 2012 from four in 2008, with actual figures likely to be significantly higher, said the report in May.

The report also said transgender women in particular have suffered from a fierce backlash against same-sex marriage and other advances.

A U.S. immigration judge warned last year of “an epidemic of unsolved violent crimes” against transgender people in Mexico.Although gender identity is not the same as sexual orientation, many transgender women in Mexico are persecuted on the assumption they are gay, experts said.

“Transgender women have become a focal point for hatred because they are often easier to detect,” said Maria Martha Collignon, a sociologist at Guadalajara’s Western Institute of Technology and Higher Education.

In addition, laws protecting gay rights in Mexico do not extend to gender identity discrimination.