MOSCOW/KYIV. Jan 24 (Interfax-AVN) - Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko will pay a working visit to Russia on Monday, the Russian presidential press service reported.
That will be the first foreign visit of Yushchenko following his inauguration on Sunday.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the visit "fully complies with Yushchenko's statements that he would pay his first visit to Russia. The Russian administration said in return then that it was ready to receive him."
"Russia and Ukraine live side by side. Our peoples are interrelated by thousands of bonds, our cultures and economies are mutually dependent, and there is nothing unnatural in Yushchenko choosing Russia as the country for his first visit," Lavrov said.