Pakistan debates joining the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen

Joining the war would mean supporting longtime ally, Saudi Arabia, but also threaten relations with neighbouring Iran, reports Tom Hussain

Saudi defence minister Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdul Aziz (R) and interior minister Mohammed bin Nayef bin Abdul Aziz (C) meet with Saudi airforce officers in Riyadh to discuss plans for the coalitionShow more

ISLAMABAD // Pakistan will hold a special session of parliament on Monday as Islamabad considers whether to join the Saudi-led coalition fighting Houthi rebels in Yemen after an intense week of consultations with Riyadh.

Prime minister Nawaz Sharif chaired a meeting with his top civilian and military officials on the Yemen crisis on Thursday, a day after a high-level delegation returned from a fact-finding trip to Riyadh attended by Pakistan’s defence minister, Khawaja Mohammed Asif, and his Saudi counterpart, Mohammad bin Salman.

At the meeting, Mr Sharif said the crisis in Yemen should be brought to an urgent end through diplomacy, and that he was working with the leaders of other Muslim countries to find a solution.

“Given the close historical cultural and religious affinities between the peoples of Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, it was reaffirmed that any isolation of Saudi Arabia’s territorial integrity will evoke a strong response from Pakistan,” the prime minister’s office said after the meeting.

He said the leaders of Pakistan’s political parties would be consulted before the government took a final decision.

It comes just one day after the main opposition parties urged Mr Sharif not to make a unilateral decision on joining the coalition against the Houthi Shiite rebels in Yemen.

Riyadh formally requested military support from Pakistan last Wednesday.

Islamabad was apparently surprised by the Saudi request, which comes as Pakistan’s military is committed to a decisive campaign against Taliban insurgents in north-west tribal areas bordering Afghanistan and the southern city of Karachi.

Alarmed opposition parties have warned the government not to take sides in a conflict widely perceived as a power struggle between Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shiite Iran, warning that it could fuel already dangerous levels of sectarian violence in Pakistan and reverse the gains of its counterterrorism campaign.

In 2014, some 440 people died in sectarian clashes in Pakistan, where Shiites make up about 23 per cent of its estimated population of 200 million people.

Besides, Pakistan shares a long border with Iran which is already angered by the Yemen assault.

Under tough questioning from opposition politicians in Pakistan’s national assembly, a day after Riyadh’s request, Mr Asif vowed Pakistan would not “take part in any conflict that could result in differences in the Muslim world, causing fault-lines present in Pakistan to be disturbed, the aggravation of which would have to be borne by Pakistan”.

“Division on the basis of religion or sect is rising in Syria, Iraq and Yemen. Instead of conflagration … it should be contained,” he said then.

The government and opposition positions have quickly shifted since, however, amid consultations with Saudi Arabia and other GCC allies including the UAE.

Following the first meeting a week ago, the government declared that Pakistan was permanently committed to the defence of Saudi Arabia, and would commit its entire military in the event that the kingdom’s territorial integrity was threatened. He did not, however, refer directly to the Houthi rebels or any other specific threat.

The opposition Pakistan People’s Party, led by former president Asif Ali Zardari, also softened its position on March 28, announcing its unreserved support for Saudi Arabia’s national security.

Security analysts said the decision was a complicated one for Pakistan, but believe Islamabad will certainly commit military assets to Saudi Arabia.

What remains unclear is whether those assets would be deployed in direct support of the military campaign in Yemen, they said.

“This is the most difficult foreign policy decision Pakistan has had to take since the September 2001 terrorist attacks,” said Moeed Yusuf, head of the South Asia programme at the United States Institute of Peace, a Washington-based think tank.

“You can’t upset the Saudis by saying ‘no’, nor can you go against Iran,” he said.

He said Iran would view Pakistan’s decision in the context of its deployment of thousands of troops to Saudi Arabia and other GCC member states in the 1980s, to defend the Gulf countries against a possible spillover from the Iran-Iraq war.

Militant Sunni and Shiite groups within Pakistan subsequently waged a vicious campaign against each other and the country’s security forces until a government crackdown in the late 1990s.

Speaking to the Capital TV cable news channel, government analysts said Pakistan had to act dispassionately and on its own strategic interest in the decision to join the Saudi-led coalition, rather than on the basis of what-ifs that could undermine its relationship with Riyadh.

Cooperation and financial assistance has continued to flow from Saudi Arabia since the 1980s, in the form of cheap oil and loans, including a loan of US$1.5 billion (Dh5.5bn) last year.

When Mr Sharif was ousted in a military coup in 1999, it was Saudi Arabia that received him in exile. “Pakistan’s strategic interests are clear: it has a deep relationship with Saudi Arabia, and it will have to stand by the Saudis in their time of need and defend it. It’s a difficult decision, but you’ll have to take it,” said Maria Sultan, who advises Pakistan’s ministry of defence on strategic policy.

Public opinion is overwhelmingly opposed to military involvement in Yemen, largely because people are upset by intra-Muslim conflicts in the Middle East.

An opinion poll conducted by Dawn, Pakistan’s leading English-language daily, found that 77 per cent of the more than 22,000 readers who voted were opposed to Pakistan joining the Saudi-led campaign.

The top Twitter trend in Pakistan on Thursday, which addressed Mr Sharif by his initials, was #NSDon’tSendArmyToYemen.

* With additional reporting from Agence France-Presse