Confidential information about a number of Turkish asylum seekers in the Netherlands may have ended up in the hands of the Turkish authorities following the arrest of a local lawyer who worked for the Dutch immigration services, the IND has confirmed.

The cases concern potential supporters of Fethullah Gulen, regarded by Turkey as being responsible for the failed coup of 2016.

The asylum seekers in the Netherlands have now been given residency permits, the IND said, without giving further details. The leak of information only concerns ‘a very limited number of cases’, the service said.

According to RTL news, the person arrested in Turkey is a local lawyer who works on behalf of the IND to check out asylum seekers claims.

One Turkish asylum seeker told RTL Nieuws that he had received a letter from the IND saying he should ‘seriously take into account’ the fact that his information was now in the hands of the Turkish authorities.

‘I am very worried about the safety of my family who have stayed behind,’ he told RTL Nieuws. ‘And I worry about my safety here. Erdogan has fanatical followers in the Netherlands and I am concerned that one of them may now attack me.’

MPs have now asked the justice ministry how many asylum applications are involved. ‘These are people who have fled to the Netherlands,’ said D66 MP Jan Paternotte. ‘So you have to be very careful with their personal data, and make sure that it does not end up in the hands of the government that they have fled from.’

The number of Turkish nationals applying for asylum in the Netherlands has gone up sharply since the coup. In 2016, their number quadrupled to 235 but last year the total reached 1,382.