Ukraine used a British-supplied Storm Shadow missile to hit a key bridge between Crimea and Russian-held parts of the Kherson region in Ukraine, pro-Moscow sources have claimed. 

Vladimir Saldo, the Russia-appointed Kherson governor, said the Storm Shadow long-range cruise missiles were likely to have been used for the attack, which damaged the road on the Chongar bridge. No casualties have been reported.

The strike comes just two days after the Kremlin warned that it would see the UK as 'full-fledged' participants in the war in Ukraine if the Storm Shadow missiles hit Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014. 

Images show a large hole in the bridge, revealing the water below, as well as rubble strewn across the road. The damaged bridge was still standing but the extent of the internal structural damage was not immediately clear. 

Saldo vowed: 'There will soon be a very serious answer.' The governor described the attack as 'another senseless action ordered from London by the Kyiv regime.'

'It solves nothing for the results of the special operation. Just to do harm,' Saldo added.

Crimea's governor, Sergey Aksyonov, said specialists were examining the site to determine when traffic over the bridge, which connects Crimea to the Russian-held parts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, could resume.

The crossing is the closest link from Crimea to Melitopol and is a key supply route for Vladimir Putin's forces to the disputed peninsula, and vice-versa.

One Russian report referred to the 'barbarous shelling of civilian objects' in describing the bridge attack.