Trump's national security advisor to meet Lukashenka in Minsk - Reuters

U.S. President Donald Trump's national security advisor John Bolton will meet with Belarusian President Aliaksandr Lukashenka, reports Reuters. He will arrive in Belarus this week, according to Foreign Policy which also notes that Bolton’s planned visit is the latest sign of thawing relations with the country often described as “Europe’s last dictatorship” and comes as Trump himself seeks better relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Reuters reports that the meeting between Lukashenka and Bolton will take place not earlier than Thursday, with the date and format yet to be finalized.

Lukashenka has repeatedly spoken about the improvement of relations between Belarus and the United States in recent years.

“Treating Belarus as a black hole and ignoring it has been a failure. It hasn’t produced any forward movement on human rights,” Foreign Policy quotes Michael Carpenter, a former deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia as saying.