PEN’s Free Expression Digest brings you a daily curated round-up of the most important free expression-related stories from around the web. Please send your feedback and suggestions to [email protected]

Three Naji Jerf murder suspects held in Turkey
Three have been arrested in Turkey over the murder of an anti-Islamic State activist and filmmaker who was shot dead in broad daylight, state media have reported. Naji Jerf, 38, was killed last month in Gaziantep, a city near the Syrian border. Mr. Jerf was the film director for Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently, a group of journalists who risk their lives daily to report on IS abuses. BBC NEWS

Palestinian prisoner on hunger strike in critical condition
Mohammed al-Qeq, 33, has been protesting his six-month sentence which was handed down without trial or charge, under a measure called administrative detention. Al-Qeq, who has been held on accusations of “incitement”, is a correspondent for the Saudi news channel al-Majd and has also appeared as an analyst for other news channels linked to Hamas. He is the first journalist to go on hunger strike in Israeli prison. ALBAWABA NEWS

Brazil arrests one of Paraguayan journalist’s suspected murderers
One of two suspects in the high-profile murder of Pablo Medina was caught in Brazil, according to ABC Color, the Paraguyan local daily where Medina worked as a correspondent for 16 years. Flavio Acosta was found in the state of Parano, where he was hiding under false identity. Medina was shot dead in an ambush in Oct. 2014. He was reporting on marijuana-trafficking along the border. TELESUR ENGLISH

Mauritanian reporter mistakenly held as Al-Qaeda chief
Cheikh Ould Salek was temporarily detained when he boarded a flight from Senegalese capital Dakar to Dubai on Jan. 3. The reporter for Sky News Arabia in Dubai was escorted off the plane and questioned for several hours at a police station. “Lucky for me, one of the officers knew my family back home and validated my true identity…I was being interrogated and jailed because my name was identical to the name of a dangerous terrorist.” The real Al-Qaeda terrorist Cheikh Ould Salek is still at large. AL JAZEERA

Twitter crackdown on hate speech backfires
Twitter has gone after a popular, albeit controversial, user as part of its crusade against violent speech. It has revoked the “verified” status of British Breitbart News journalist Milo Yiannopoulous, who has over 140,000 Twitter followers and has been vocal in the contentious movement known as GamerGate, which claims to promote ethics in gaming journalism but has been condemned for its treatment of women. Yiannopolous said he gained over 7,000 followers following the company’s actions. CNN MONEY

Ugandan gov’t is intimidating journalists in effort to limit criticism
According to a new report by Human Rights Watch, while print journalists working in English have some relative freedom, radio journalists – particularly those working in local languages whose listeners are based in rural areas – face harassment and threats from an array of government and party officials. The country will hold presidential and parliamentary elections on Feb. 18. HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH

Bureau chief: Sean Penn’s El Chapo meeting an insult to Mexican journalists
The problem with the American actor’s first-person account of meeting with the drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, Mexico City Bureau Chief for the Dallas Morning News Alfredo Corchado says, is that the story, which was submitted for Guzmán’s approval before it was made public, is evidence of the inherent conflict between journalism and entertainment. “When you’re not really challenging the person and have agreed to submit the story…it’s not on par with the sacrifice of many of my colleagues in Mexico and throughout the world who have lost their lives fighting censorship.” THE WASHINGTON POST