Nigeria has declared support for Saudi Arabia’s proposal to establish a multinational maritime defence alliance to protect international shipping routes and global trade.

Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Defence, in a statement on Thursday, said 13 other countries also supported the initiative.

The ministry, which noted that the alliance was established as a framework to strengthen collective maritime defence cooperation, said representatives of 43 countries (out of 51 that were invited) took part in the meeting to establish the alliance.

Aside from the inclusion of the European Union delegation, Turkiye, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Jordan, Egypt, Pakistan, Djibouti, Somalia, Bangladesh, Yemen, Sudan and the Comoros are among the signatories to the alliance.

“The door remains open for other countries to accede to the coalition’s charter after completing their national procedures,” the Saudi government stated.

The Gulf nation noted that the participating nations were united in the conviction that maritime security is a shared responsibility and that cooperation and coordination among states constitute the cornerstone for confronting common and transnational maritime threats.

According to the statement, it was agreed that Saudi Arabia would become the founding and leading country of the alliance and would undertake hosting the alliance’s main headquarters.

The proposal came amid U.S.-Iran tensions, especially over the Strait of Hormuz, as the virtual closure of the route, which formerly carried about 20 per cent of global oil and gas exports, is taking a toll on the global economy.

Amid the war, Saudi Arabia has been able to continue to export most of its oil through the East-West pipeline, which connects oil refineries in the country’s east to the terminal of Yanbu on the Red Sea coast.