Two trans women found stabbed to death in their apartment. Three men have already been arrested.

Police in Pakistan on Wednesday held a news conference to announce the arrest of three men in the brutal stabbing deaths of two transgender women in Mardan, in the country’s conservative northwest, the Associated Press reports.

The handcuffed men, their heads covered in hoods, were present. The district police chief said the three alleged assailants had confessed to the killings during questioning after their apprehension on Tuesday.

Related:

“Our heads should hang in shame”: Pakistani activists outraged after court repeals trans rights laws

Activists have vowed to challenge the decision before the Supreme Court.

Photos of the crime scene show a large, dried pool of blood on the balcony outside the front door of the victims’ home in an apartment complex. The attack took place on Sunday.

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The arrests followed a day of calls for justice from representatives of the trans community in northwestern Pakistan, who urged police in the region to detain the perpetrators as quickly as possible.

So-called “honor killings” carried out by relatives to punish perceived sexual transgressions are common in Muslim-majority Pakistan, where transgender people are often subjected to harassment, abuse, and attacks. Authorities did not cite a motive for the murders.

The killings follow a ruling in May by Pakistan’s Federal Shariat Court that struck down a number of provisions of the historic Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act after declaring the statute to be “un-Islamic.”

The court maintained a person cannot change gender based on “innermost feeling” or “self-perceived identity” and must adhere to their sex assigned at birth.

The overturned law, passed in 2018 by Pakistan’s national assembly, was then seen as a progressive step toward the realization of transgender rights in the conservative Muslim nation. It granted legal status and outlawed harassment and discrimination toward transgender Pakistanis.

The transgender community found some acceptance as well after a group of clerics in 2016 declared marriage between transgender individuals was permissible in Islam and said transgender individuals have a right to be buried in Muslim graveyards.

“The ruling of the Shariat Court is highly valued in Pakistan. This order will have dangerous implications for the transgender community,” Pakistani transgender activist Shahzadi Rai told LGBTQ Nation after the court handed down its decision.

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