The protocol states that the parliaments of the two countries will exchange political, constitutional, legislative and parliamentary information on a regular basis.

The statement also said that MPs and deputies from the two countries will exchange visits and coordinate political positions on major international and regional developments of mutual concern.

A source in parliament told Ahram Online that the protocol indicates that political relations between Egypt and Qatar have reached an advanced level of understanding on international and regional developments.

The source added that the rapprochement between the political leadership in the two countries in recent months and the growing interest of Qataris in investing in Egypt paved the way for signing the parliamentary protocol and made it possible.

The signing of the parliamentary protocol came following a meeting between speaker of Egypt's House of Representatives Hanafi El-Gebaly and speaker of the Consultative Assembly of Qatar Hassan bin Abdullah Al-Ghanim in the Qatari capital of Doha on Wednesday.

“Speaker El-Gebaly seized the meeting to congratulate Qatar on its successful hosting of the World Football Cup and that this demonstrates that Arab countries are highly capable of organising big international events,” said a statement.

For his part, Qatar's Al-Ghanim said "the visit of the high-ranking Egyptian parliamentary delegation to Doha will give a lot of momentum to the brotherly relations between the two countries, and will surely have a positive impact on the political, economic and parliamentary relations between the two countries in the coming stage."

El-Gebaly’s visit to Qatar is his first to the Gulf country after the return of diplomatic relations between the two countries following the Al-Ula agreement last year, which ended more than three years of rupture between the two countries.

It also comes less than two months after President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi’s two-day visit to Doha to discuss economic cooperation between the two countries with Emir Tamim.