Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt will visit Donetsk on November 23 at the invitation of Ukrainian businessman and lawmaker Rinat Akhmetov.
The Swedish minister's visit will be informal and will involve a meeting with Akhmetov dedicated to the situation in Ukraine, Interfax-Ukraine learned at the Swedish Embassy in Ukraine.
On November 23, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski will also come to Donetsk at Akhmetov's invitation to attend the Champions League group stage match between Shakhtar Donetsk and Porto, the Ukrainska Pravda online newspaper reported. "The European politicians are expected to attempt to influence [Ukrainian President] Viktor Yanukovych through the people from the president's entourage," the Ukrainska Pravda reported.
According to the report, the visit of Bildt and Sikorski could be "the last chance to convince Yanukovych to change his point of view on Tymoshenko and backsliding on democracy before the Ukraine – EU summit, where the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement is to be initialed."
