Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent discussions he had held with his Egyptian counterpart on the new parliamentary elections law in that country.

The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Mr Hague), has yet to meet his new counterpart, Foreign Minister Sameh Shukri who was sworn in on 17 June. He did raise the issue of parliamentary elections and the need for political inclusiveness with former Egyptian Foreign Minister Nabil Fahmy on 14 May before the new law was passed.