Apple’s Friday filing of a complaint with the International Trade Commission (ITC), requesting the imposition of a ban on imports of Nokia’s mobile phones; from the Finnish manufacturer, has further intensified its ongoing dispute with the Finnish manufacturer.

The Apple move comes in response to Nokia’s December filing of its complaint with the ITC - an autonomous federal agency that checks up issues like unfair trade practices, involving infringement of patents, copyrights, and trademarks – accusing Apple of violating seven Nokia patents “in virtually all of its mobile phones, portable music players, and computers.”  

In its complaint, Nokia had urged the ITC to ban imports of Apple’s iPhone, iPod, and MacBook products. However, prior to the ITC complaint, Nokia had filed a lawsuit in US District Court in Delaware in October, alleging that Apple had refused to license 10 of Nokia patents, pertaining to wireless handsets, which the iPhone maker had infringed upon.

Nokia’s insistence that Apple should license the patents it infringes is justifiable because it has spent nearly $90 million, in the last two decades, on the development of cell phone technology.

Meanwhile, saying that Nokia will defend itself “vigorously” against the Apple complaint, Nokia’s spokesperson Mark Durrant told Bloomberg: “Apple has failed to agree appropriate terms for using Nokia technology and has been seeking a free ride on Nokia's innovation since it shipped the first iPhone in 2007.”