Oscar Lopez, Thomson Reuters Foundation

MEXICO CITY, April 29 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Puerto Rico has been hit by an “epidemic of violence” with five transgender murders in two months, LGBT+ activists said on Wednesday, adding that homophobic rhetoric from politicians and religious leaders may have fuelled the bloodshed.

Opposition lawmakers and campaigners called on the government to publicly acknowledge and investigate the violence, after the bodies of two trans women were found inside a charred car last week and another trans woman was killed in February.

“Trans people are living in fear, they are terrified,” said Pedro Julio Serrano, spokesman for the Broad Committee for the Search for Equality, an LGBT+ rights advocacy group.

“It’s as if they’ve opened hunting season against the LGBT+ community, and they’re hunting us, they’re looking for us and they are killing us,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

The Puerto Rican Governor’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Police commissioner Henry Escalera Rivera said that he had met with representatives of the LGBT+ community “to work together for a better Puerto Rico”. Read more via Reuters