WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama rebuffed pressure for quick U.S. action in two foreign crises Thursday, declining to label Russia’s military moves into Ukraine an invasion and saying that he was not ready to expand an air campaign against Islamist militants to Syria.

While pledging that the administration would penalize Moscow for opening a new front against Ukrainian forces, Obama ruled out U.S. military action and described the Kremlin’s moves as a continuation of a pattern rather than a new phase in the struggle between pro-Russia separatists and Ukraine’s government.

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