Pakistan’s former military officer Lieutenant General Noman Mahmood has been appointed the first secretary-general of the Mecca Defence Pact, a trilateral security agreement signed by Saudi Arabia, Türkiye and Pakistan.
Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry confirmed the appointment in a statement on Wednesday, saying Mahmood would serve as the administrative head of the pact’s general secretariat, based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Mahmood served as president of Pakistan’s National Defence University (NDU) in Islamabad from November 2021 to April 2023. He joined the Pakistan Army in 1987 and retired from military service in 2023.
The Mecca Joint Defence Agreement was signed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.
The pact is aimed at strengthening collective deterrence among the three countries while promoting regional security, peace, stability and economic development.
A key provision states that an armed attack against any one of the signatories will be regarded as an attack against all three members, establishing a collective-defence mechanism broadly comparable to the principle underpinning Article 5 of NATO.
What is the Mecca Defence Pact?
The agreement brings together Saudi Arabia, Türkiye and Pakistan, three countries with significant military, economic and strategic influence across the Muslim world.
The pact expands the longstanding strategic defence relationship between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan by bringing Türkiye into a formal trilateral framework. It has become known as the “Mecca Pact” because the agreement was signed in the holy city of Mecca.
Beyond collective defence, the framework is intended to facilitate intelligence sharing, joint military exercises, cooperation in drone technology and efforts to develop and manufacture advanced weapons jointly.
The initiative comes amid growing regional instability in the Middle East and increasing threats from missile and drone attacks. Saudi Arabia has sought to strengthen its own and regional defence capabilities while reducing reliance on Western security partners.
The three-country arrangement is being closely watched as a new form of defence cooperation among major Muslim-majority powers, with potential implications for security coordination across the Middle East and wider region.
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