NGO demands Venezuelan trans woman's murder in Spain be recognized as femicide

An organization advocating for transgender rights in Spain is demanding that the recent murder of Franyel, a 35-year-old Venezuelan transgender woman, be officially classified as gender-based violence, or 'violencia machista.' Franyel was killed by her partner on Sunday in Marbella, southern Spain.

The Spanish Trans Association of Andalusia-Sylvia Rivera (ATA) asserts that Franyel was a victim of a "chain of violence" that should not end with her death. The NGO is urging Spain's Ministries of Equality and Justice, along with relevant judicial authorities, to treat her killing as a femicide.

Mar Cambrollé, president of ATA, stated that Franyel suffered not only from her partner's violence but also from governmental "negligence." Cambrollé pointed to the prolonged delay, over three years since the approval of the Trans Law, in establishing procedures that would allow transgender migrants to effectively change their legal gender documentation. This inaction, the NGO argues, left Franyel vulnerable.

ATA insists that Franyel should not become a victim again due to institutions that, by preventing her from updating her documents, now refuse to recognize her as a woman and her murder as gender-based violence. The association is calling for clear criteria to ensure that no migrant trans woman is excluded from protection against gender-based violence simply because of registration issues.

"Franyel was a woman, lived as a woman, and was murdered as a woman," Cambrollé affirmed. She emphasized that "real equality will never be built on the exclusion or forgetfulness of any woman." The NGO finds it particularly egregious that this "documentary discordance, a consequence of years of administrative inaction," could be used to deny Franyel her identity and the recognition of the violence she suffered.