White House reviews sanctions on Russia:
The Trump White House is reviewing the series of sanctions imposed on Russia by the Obama administration and has no position right now on whether to maintain them, a top Trump official has said.
White House economic adviser Gary Cohn said on May 25 that European leaders asked President Donald Trump whether he planned to extend the sanctions, first imposed in 2014 primarily over Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea, during a NATO summit in Brussels this week.
His response was he hadn't decided what to do yet, Cohn said in a briefing for reporters on Air Force One en route to a Group of Seven summit in Sicily on May 25.
"I think the president is looking at it. Right now, we don't have a position," Cohn said, adding that Trump had "many options" he is considering.
Trump said during his campaign that he was open to lifting the sanctions, but his ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, has said the administration will not lift them unless Russia returns Crimea to Ukraine.
Sanctions were imposed separately by the United States and European Union in 2014 and have been repeatedly extended and expanded since then. (AP, Reuters)
That concludes our live-blogging of the Ukraine crisis for Thursday, May 25, 2017. Check back here tomorrow for more of our continuing coverage. Thanks for reading and take care.