Tymoshenko agrees to seek medical treatment in Germany, opening way for Yanukovych to release her from prison

Imprisoned ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko has accepted an offer to seek medical treatment in Germany, her lawyer Serhiy Vlasenko said today, reading from a statement that she signed. “Pat Cox and Aleksander Kwasniewski gave me an official offer to get medical treatment in Germany,” Vlasenko read from Tymoshenko’s statement. “I publicly accept this offer.” Cox, the former president of the European Parliament, and Kwasniewski, the former president of Poland, are said to have met with Tymoshenko on Oct. 3 and renewed their appeal to President Viktor Yanukovych to pardon her. They have been part of a European Union monitoring mission to Ukraine. On Oct. 15, Cox and Kwasniewski are scheduled to submit their report on whether the country is meeting the requisite requirements to sign a landmark free trade and political association agreement with the 28-nation union. EU leaders have made freeing Tymoshenko a condition for signing a free-trade and political association agreement with Ukraine at the Nov. 28-29 summit in Vilnius, Lithuania. Now the fate of Tymoshenko -- and so much more -- is in Yanukovych's hands. Yanukovych's spokespeople could not be immediately reached for comment. Earlier today, Yanukovych met with a European parliamentary delegation from the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe bloc. Vlasenko added that Tymoshenko promised not to permanently emigrate. “I shall never and nowhere seek political asylum, I shall not hide abroad. I’m through being scared," Vlasenko read from Tymoshenko’s letter.