Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkiye meet: What’s next for their defence pact?

Islamabad, Pakistan — Officials from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkiye are in Istanbul on Monday for their first meeting since they signed a new mutual defence pact .

The meeting comes hours after Washington and Tehran traded strikes for the first time in a month, breaking a lull in a war that has now run for more than six months, after the US and Israel launched attacks on Iran on February 28.

Field Marshal Asim Munir, Pakistan’s Chief of Defence Forces, and Deputy Prime Minister, Ishaq Dar, were already in Turkiye by Sunday. Dar flew in from London, where he had just wrapped up a separate visit.

Pakistani officials have suggested in recent weeks that Egypt might also join the Monday meeting — not to discuss the defence agreement, but as part of a foursome that has played a key mediating role in trying to end the US war on Iran.

The group of four last met in Amman on August 5 and, before that, in Cairo in June, where they welcomed the signing of the Pakistan-brokered Islamabad memorandum of understanding between the US and Iran.

But irrespective of whether Egypt attends, analysts say that the spotlight will be on officials from the three countries that signed the joint defence agreement in Mecca on August 7.

The Strategic Political and Defence Committee created under that joint defence agreement is meeting in Istanbul, and while the pact may have established the principle of collective defence, analysts say a key question remains unanswered: Just how will that commitment function on the ground?

Pakistan’s delegation is led by Dar, Munir and Defence Minister Khawaja Asif.