Pakistan, Turkey and Saudi Arabia forge mutual defense pact as Houthi attacks rise

Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Turkey concluded a mutual defence agreement on Friday, pledging to treat an armed attack on any one of them as an attack on all three. The pact was signed during a meeting in Riyadh attended by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.

"The Agreement is intended to strengthen collective deterrence against any act of aggression," Pakistan's foreign ministry said. The arrangement comes as Saudi Arabia seeks to broaden its security partnerships amid ongoing threats to its infrastructure. In eastern Yemen, Iran-backed Houthi forces launched missile and drone attacks on Marib province, hitting a Saudi-backed military camp and nearby residential areas. Yemen’s health minister said the strikes killed two people and injured 14. Houthi spokesperson Yahya Saree said the group targeted the camp’s storage facilities and warned it would continue to strike Saudi-supported forces. The Houthis also struck Saudi Arabia’s Najran region near the Yemeni border, wounding 11 civilians, including a woman and a child, according to a statement from the Saudi-led coalition. Separately, Israeli shelling in southern Lebanon lightly wounded a Lebanese soldier working on road clearance in the village of Mansouri, where Israeli forces had earlier warned residents to evacuate following alleged Hezbollah violations of a ceasefire.