Nine people allegedly abducted and gang-raped a prominent trans activist in Pakistan.
Sama* was attacked on January 22 in the city of Peshawar and threatened with death if she revealed her ordeal to anyone.
In a video uploaded to the Trans Action Pakistan Facebook page, Sama said she was attacked for being an outspoken trans activist.
Sama tried to file a complaint at the Gulbahar police station after the crime. But officers refused to complete a First Incident Report.
The police sent Sama for medical examination and claimed the incident was nothing more than a falling out between friends.
“It is a routine matter and that is why medical examination was not carried out,’ a Gulbahar police told Dawn.
The same official said mediation attempts had begun to ‘patch up between the two sides’.
But on 27 January the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Mian Saqib Nisar made a motion within the Supreme Court to investigate Sama’s kidnapping and gang rape.
The CJP called for local police to send him a report on the incident within three days.
Organized gang
Another human rights activist in Pakistan, Taimur Kamal, told The Express Tribune an organised crime gang was responsible for the ongoing violence against the trans community in Peshawar.
‘Law enforcers are reluctant to take action against the gang despite the series of attacks,’ Kamal said.
Peshawar is the oldest city in Pakistan and sits near the Afghan border. It is also home to some of the most horrific violence against trans women in the country.
In October last year a local morgue refused to take the body of a trans woman who had been tortured and beheaded because she would make their ‘freezers dirty’.
The following month a group of men stormed the apartment of a trans woman, shooting her six times and killing her.
Laws not catching up to society
Despite the extreme violence facing the Pakistani trans community, there have been some wins for the community.
Pakistan is one of the few countries that has a third gender option on passports and included trans people on the national census.
The Federal Parliament is also debating bills which would make it illegal to discriminate against trans people.
*Not her real name.
