Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte has denied claims that the government has not done enough to help columnist Ebru Umar following her arrest in Turkey, allegedly for sending out insulting tweets about president Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

‘Worse than that, it has been suggested that we have not acted because of the refugee deal with Turkey,’ Rutte said. ‘But we will not let ourselves be influenced by other interests.’

If there was any truth in the claims, the Netherlands, the cabinet and the entire Dutch society would be in total decay, Rutte said. Both he and foreign minister Bert Koenders had been busy with the issue all day, ‘because that is our job,’ Rutte told reporters.

Umar, a Dutch national of Turkish descent, was arrested on Saturday evening while on holiday in the Aegean resort of Kusadasi. She told state broadcaster Nos that police had come to her door and questioned her over ‘a few Tweets’.

The Metro columnist spent the night in custody before being released on Sunday morning, but was ordered to stay in the country. She appeared briefly in court on Monday morning, accompanied by a lawyer supplied by the consulate in Izmir, and is expected to learn shortly whether she will face charges.

Meanwhile Umar has responded to alleged support for her arrest by Dutch Turks with a hard hitting column in which she likened them to Dutch national socialists during World War II.

‘Congratulations on your loyalty to a bunch of mountain goats from Turkey, goat fuckers if you like, whom you obey when they call for NSB behaviour,’ she wrote in Metro. ‘You are the reason I am stuck in Turkey.’