Four transgender women have been murdered within weeks of each other in Pakistan.

Three transgender women were shot dead in a drive-by on the night of 8 May.

The two motorcycle riders opened fire on a group transgender women who were standing on the corner of a busy street in Rawalpindi.

Billi and Shah Zaib died at the scene and Saima Shahzadi died the next morning in hospital. Four others, including two transgender women, were injured.

‘The attackers could be those who did not like the presence of transgenders in the locality,’ Almas Bobby, president of the Hijra Foundation Pakistan told the Dawn news site.

The shootings came less than a week after the burned and multilated body of another transgender woman was found near a bus stop in Islamabad.

Police said Bijli, 30, was strangled.

The deceased was identified by other transgender women based on her clothes. She was reported missing 10 days before her body was found.