On 31 August, Istanbul hosted the first meeting of the signatories to the Mecca Defence Agreement — Pakistan, Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
According to statements from the states themselves, high-ranking representatives from the military and security sectors are taking part in the talks, including the ministers of defence and foreign affairs, as well as the chiefs of staff of all three countries.
The document itself, known as the Mecca Agreement, was signed on 7 August against the backdrop of escalating tensions in the Middle East, where Israel and the United States found themselves embroiled in a confrontation with Iran.
One of the key provisions of the agreement explicitly enshrines the principle of collective defence: any armed attack on one of the three countries will be regarded as an attack on all three states.
Following the signing of the agreement, Turkey’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan emphasised that it was not directed against Iran. He noted, however, that the document was, in essence, comparable to Article 5 of the NATO Treaty on collective defence.
Fidan also stated that Egypt and other states might join the pact – which the leaders of the three countries had signed the previous day – in the future, once a number of technical issues had been resolved.