325 murders of trans and gender nonconfirming people have been documented around the world in 2017

Every year, on November 20, we pay tribute to the lives of trans and gender-nonconfirming people whose murders became known within the year.

In 2017, 325 murders of trans and gender nonconfirming people have been documented around the world.

 

A total of 2,609 murders of trans and gender nonconfirming people were documented from January 2008 to September 2017 in 71 countries.

Of all the victims of the documented murders whose professions were known, 62 percent were sex workers. In Europe, a large number of victims of documented murders were migrants.

 

In most countries of the Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA) region, there are no statistics on cases of transphobic violence against trans people, since the facts of crimes and offenses against people with different gender identities here are still being ignored.

 

One of the factors contributing to violence against trans people is the lack of anti-discrimination legislation in the EECA countries, and some existing laws indirectly contribute to stigmatization of community members.

 

The recommendations of the UN “Born Free and Equal” call on states to protect people from homophobic and transphobic violence, to ensure effective investigation and prosecution of perpetrators and reparations to victims of such violence.

The tradition of celebrating Transgender Remembrance Day began with when back in 1999, friends of a Boston trans black rock musician Rita Hester, who was killed a year earlier, organized a “memory vigil” in her honor. Later, the event has grown in scale and began to take place in dozens of cities, not only in the United States, but throughout the world.