国内英语新闻:China, Egypt vow to strengthen strategic ties

CAIRO, March 25 (Xinhua) -- Senior Chinese legislator Wang Zhaoguo, who is on a four-day visit to Egypt, met here Thursday with Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif, discussing ways to strengthen strategic cooperation between the two countries.

Wang, vice-chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislative body, led an NPC delegation to Egypt for an official goodwill visit starting from Tuesday afternoon.

Wang said Egypt and China are important developing countries and the two peoples will benefit from the progress of bilateral ties.

"We should boost our cooperation in agriculture, culture, education, science and technology, health care and tourism in the coming years," Wang said.

For his part, Nazif said Egypt has witnessed China's huge achievements through reforms and opening up and China plays an important role in world affairs.

"Egypt attaches great importance to the strategic cooperation with China and I hope our cooperation in various fields will bear more fruit in the future," Nazif said.

Wang, who is also a member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, hailed the strategic friendship between China and Egypt, noting that bilateral relationship has been developing faster in recent years under the auspices of both heads of state.

"The China-Egypt friendship is a good example for developing countries and South-South cooperation," Wang said.

China and Egypt established strategic cooperation partnership in 2009. Bilateral trade surpassed 6 billion U.S. dollars in 2009.