Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Türkiye would consider how to support Saudi Arabia if the kingdom has military needs arising from attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels. Speaking to broadcaster NTV on Friday, Fidan linked any assistance to the trilateral defence pact between Türkiye, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, according to Al Jazeera.
Fidan said it was unacceptable for Saudi Arabia to be drawn into the US-Iran war and argued that Riyadh did not want to join the conflict. He also said proposals had been conveyed to all sides in an effort to end the fighting, but provided no further details, Al Jazeera reported.
The Houthis and Saudi Arabia continue to exchange attacks in Yemen. Al Jazeera said the conflict is escalating as the Iran-backed rebels press gains that have brought large parts of Yemen’s Red Sea coast, including the strategic Bab al-Mandeb Strait, under their control.
Pakistan has separately pledged to defend Saudi Arabia under the same arrangement. Lieutenant-General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, a spokesperson for Pakistan’s military, told Arab News that Islamabad would defend the kingdom “to any extent”, including “physically”, although he did not say whether Riyadh had requested additional Pakistani troops.
Pakistan’s Foreign Office has said that no military response is currently under discussion under the pact and that Islamabad would act “when time comes”. The agreement was signed in Mecca on August 7 by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.
The arrangement was formally named the Mecca Defence Alliance on August 31 after officials meeting in Istanbul agreed to establish a secretariat in Riyadh, initially led by a Pakistani secretary-general. Its founding principle is that an armed attack on any member would be treated as an attack on all three. Analysts cited by Al Jazeera have questioned the pact’s practical strength, noting that it lacks NATO’s integrated command structure and standing forces, while the process for activating its mutual-defence clause remains unclear.