Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao held talks with Egyptian speaker of the People's Assembly (parliament) Ahmed Fathi Sorour in Cairo on Sunday.

 

During the meeting, Wen said that the communication between the two parliaments is an important part of the bilateral relations, which plays an important role in promoting bilateral cooperation.

 

He said that the full support given by the Egyptian People's Assembly was a key to the stable and smooth development of the Egypt-China ties in the last 50 years, hoping the Egyptian parliament would continue to support the development of the Sino-Egypt ties.

 

Wen pointed out that the two sides on Saturday signed "the Implementary Outlines for Deepening the Strategic Cooperative Relations between the People's Republic of China and the Arab Republic of Egypt," which outlines the bilateral exchanges and cooperation in various fields, including the contacts between the legislatures and political parties of the two countries.

 

He expressed that China's National People's Congress (NPC) was keen on maintaining close contacts with the Egyptian People's Assembly and welcomed more Egyptian lawmakers to visit China to make new contributions to the development of the Sino-Egypt relations.

 

For his part, Sorour said that the Egyptian people are friendly to the Chinese people and admire China's great achievements in national construction.

 

The Egyptian People's Assembly was willing to enhance association with China's NPC to learn from each other's experience in national construction and actively boost friendly cooperation between the two countries.

 

Wen wrapped up his two-day official visit to Egypt and left for Ghana later on Sunday.

 

Egypt is the first leg of his seven-nation visit to Africa, which also takes him to the Republic of Congo, Angola, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda.

 

(Xinhua News Agency June 19, 2006)