Russia has threatened to ban sales of a key rocket engine to the United States in response to new sanctions over the Skripal poisoning.

Sergei Ryabukhin, head of the budget committee in the upper house of parliament, called the measures announced by the state department late on Wednesday the “most obnoxious and cynical behaviour on the market” and said Russia has the means to respond if leader Vladimir Putin wishes to do so.

“The United States needs to finally understand that it's useless to fight with Russia, including with the help of sanctions,” he said.

He said Russia could in particular stop exports to the United States of the RD-180 rocket engine, which powers the first stage of the Atlas 5 rocket made by Boeing and Lockheed Martin.

Lawmakers in Washington had to partially roll back a 2014 ban on Russian engines in military and spy satellite launches due to US reliance on the RD-180.

Since its introduction in 2002, the Atlas 5 has carried the top-secret X-37B space plane, the New Horizons probe that flew by Pluto and the Curiosity rover that has been exploring the surface of Mars.

It is slated to take astronauts to the International Space Station in its first manned flight in 2019 following several delays.