Makkah defence pact open to any country sharing its vision, including Iran, Pakistan's military spokesman says
Pakistan's military spokesman Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry has said the Makkah Joint Defence Agreement places no bar on new members and that any country sharing its vision of collective deterrence and regional peace would be welcome.
Pakistan's military spokesman has said the Makkah defence pact signed by Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkiye is open to new members, including Iran, provided they share the alliance's vision of collective deterrence and regional peace. The statement is the clearest signal yet that the August agreement could grow beyond its three founding states.
Lieutenant General Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, director general of Inter-Services Public Relations, made the remarks in an interview with Reuters on Friday, his first since a high-level Pakistani delegation visited Tehran this week. Asked directly whether Iran could join, he said the wording of the pact placed no bar on membership.
"Anyone who has a shared vision of collective deterrence and regional peace, why not? Everyone is most welcome," he said, adding that any decision on admitting a new member would rest with the political leadership of the three founding countries rather than with the armed forces.
The agreement, signed in Makkah on 7 August, treats an armed attack on any one signatory as an attack on all of them. It has taken on added significance as the war involving Iran has redrawn regional alignments and raised fears of a wider Middle East conflict, with Houthi missile and drone attacks repeatedly targeting Saudi territory.
Chaudhry's comments came alongside a cautiously optimistic assessment of Pakistan's mediation between Washington and Tehran. Pakistan's Chief of Defence Forces and army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, has travelled to Tehran twice this month, most recently on Monday alongside Saudi Defence Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman and Turkish intelligence chief Ibrahim Kalin.
Those talks were the first high-level contact between Iran and all members of the Makkah alliance since Saudi Arabia was drawn deeper into the conflict, and Pakistani officials have presented them as a sign that diplomatic channels remain open even as fighting continues in the Gulf.
The spokesman also set out the limits of Pakistan's role. He said Pakistan remained committed to defending Saudi Arabia and the holy sites of Makkah and Madinah, but stressed that the country was not part of the Yemeni conflict, describing it as an internal Yemeni matter. Any further deployment of Pakistani troops to the kingdom, he said, would depend on the situation and on decisions by the political leadership of both countries.
The openness to new members has also been signalled from Ankara. Turkish Deputy Foreign Minister Levent Gumrukcu said earlier this week that expansion of the pact was planned in the near future and could follow a process similar to NATO accession, with ratification by parliament. Turkey's parliamentary foreign affairs committee has already approved the ratification bill, clearing it for a vote in the full assembly.
Analysts say the pact pairs complementary strengths: Saudi capital and geography, Turkiye's growing defence industry, and Pakistan's large, combat-tested armed forces. A permanent secretariat for the alliance is planned in Riyadh, with a Pakistani official set to serve as its first secretary-general.
Whether Iran, or any other state, moves from being welcomed in principle to joining in practice will depend on the political decisions of Riyadh, Ankara and Islamabad, and on whether the current mediation effort produces a durable easing of tensions. For now, the door has been left visibly open.
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