BRUSSELS — Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko on Thursday said he believed he still had US support following the election of Donald Trump as president, despite the president-elect’s campaign pledge that he ‘‘would be looking into’’ recognizing Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula.

Poroshenko has been forced into a reversal, campaigning in Brussels on Thursday for the European Union to make sure that the United States upholds its sanctions against Russia, which were instituted after the 2014 Crimean annexation and subsequent conflict in Ukraine’s east. Just weeks ago, it was the United States that was pressuring Europe to maintain unity on sanctions, which some nations want to abandon.

Poroshenko and a senior EU leader said they were optimistic the European Union would extend sanctions before they expire at the end of January.

Washington Post