Turkish FM: Efforts underway to ease Saudi-Houthi tensions
Shafaq News- Ankara
Efforts are underway to ease Saudi-Houthi tensions amid an increasingly complicated situation around the Bab al-Mandab Strait, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said on Saturday.
In an interview with NTV, Fidan stated that US-Iran talks had reached a deadlock in recent months. Fidan said both sides had begun interpreting the negotiations in ways that served their own interests. “If new proposals are put forward, I hope they will accept them. Otherwise, the crisis has been tolerated to some extent, but its economic repercussions have now exceeded acceptable levels.”
On whether the alliance could provide military support to Saudi Arabia against the Houthis, the Turkish FM said the recent attacks posed a serious threat to the Kingdom’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, adding that the agreement includes provisions for mutual support.
Asked about expanding the Makkah Alliance following Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia, he said its members were making rapid progress and that the coalition remained open to other countries in the region.
Responding to Israeli and Iranian claims that the Makkah Alliance remained only “on paper,” Fidan dismissed the criticism, pointing to Turkiye’s NATO membership since 1952 and saying the alliance would be a “game-changing platform.”
Saudi Arabia, Turkiye and Pakistan signed the Makkah Agreement on August 7, establishing a mutual defense alliance under which an armed attack on any of the three countries is considered an attack on all of them.
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