Turkiye, Pakistan agree Saudi Arabia military deployment under Mecca pact

Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan agreed Monday to “immediately” implement collective defense commitments and take measures to ensure the “rapid deployment” of agreed military forces and capabilities to Saudi Arabia, according to a joint statement.

The decision came during an emergency meeting of the Mecca Alliance’s Strategic Political and Defense Committee in the Saudi capital Riyadh to address security developments and threats facing the kingdom.

“The Committee decided to move immediately to the practical implementation of the collective defense commitments,” said the joint statement of the three member states sitting on the committee.

It also agreed “to take the necessary measures to provide the agreed military forces and capabilities and ensure their rapid deployment in the Kingdom.”

The deployment will proceed in line with “the approved arrangements and the national legislation of the Parties, thereby enhancing readiness, military integration, and the collective capacity to confront and counter threats,” it added.

The three countries also condemned “in the strongest terms the attempted targeting” of the holy cities of Mecca and Medina along with continuing attacks on other Saudi cities and civilian and economic facilities.

The Mecca Alliance says it has agreed to trigger collective deterrence measures in response to “heinous attacks” by Yemen’s Houthi group against Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia’s Defence Minister, Khalid bin Salman, said the member countries agreed to trigger the deployment in response “to the attacks and all those responsible for them”, Al Jazeera reports.

The announcement comes as the Saudi-backed Yemeni government has launched a counteroffensive to push the Iran-aligned Houthis back from territory captured last month.

The agreement was reached during an emergency meeting of the Strategic Political and Defence Committee under the three countries’ Mecca Alliance in Riyadh.

The mutual defence pact was signed in August, shortly before the Houthis launched their offensive in Yemen, which has included attacks against Saudi targets. Questions as to whether Islamabad and Ankara would agree to trigger the agreement have persisted since.

However, with hostilities increasing in Yemen, the committee agreed to “move immediately” to implement the collective defence measures to “ensure their rapid deployment in the Kingdom,” the joint statement reads.

The defence commitments will be executed under “approved arrangements” and the laws of the three countries, the statement added.

The Mecca Defence Alliance emerged as a response to intensifying regional conflicts, including the war by the United States and Israel on Iran.

The agreement to form the new alliance was signed by the three countries on August 7. It declares that an attack on any one of the three states will be treated as an attack on all – mirroring a key NATO stipulation.

While steps to institutionalise the Mecca Alliance followed, the agreement did not initially give details on the military or defence obligations of each country.

Following a barrage of missiles launched by the Houthis toward Saudi Arabia in early September, Pakistan’s Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said any attack on the kingdom could trigger the agreement.

“If there is unprovoked aggression, or a spillover of whatever is happening in Yemen into Saudi Arabia, definitely the Mecca agreement will become operational,” he told the Pakistani media outlet Geo News.

However, no action has been taken until now, with analysts noting that Pakistan and Turkiye remain keen to continue acting as mediators of the US-Iran conflict.

The three members of the alliance combined have nearly 1.4 million active troops, about 3,400 military aircraft, 6,000 tanks and more than 340 naval assets, according to the 2026 Global Firepower Index.

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