WASHINGTON, March 3 – The United States will maintain sanctions against Russia until Russia leaves Crimea, U.S. Ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) James Gilmore has said.

"We're sticking to our sanctions on Crimea, and there are separate sanctions on eastern Ukraine. And the declaration that we have is that we will never abandon the sanctions on Crimea until they get out of Crimea. We will – we also are going to maintain our sanctions with respect to eastern Ukraine, and I think these are important measures that we take that are diplomatic actions that we take for the purpose of standing up for what's right," Gilmore said at a press conference on March 2.