Apple on Friday pulled off another victory against rival Samsung, the second in a week, when it succeeded in getting U.S. sales of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus blocked.

U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh granted Apple a preliminary injunction against the Galaxy Nexus phone, which went on sale in the United States in mid December.

Apple and Samsung, the world's two largest consumer electronics corporations, are locked in legal battles leveling charges of patent violations at each other in a bid to out-do each other in fiercely competitive smartphone market.

 “Although Samsung will necessarily be harmed by being forced to withdraw its product from the market before the merits can be determined after a full trial, the harm faced by Apple absent an injunction is greater,” Koh said in her ruling yesterday. “Apple’s interest in enforcing its patent rights is particularly strong because it has presented a strong case on the merits.”

Few days back, US District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California slapped a pre-trial ban on sales of Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1, a tablet computer that runs on Google Inc's Android and goes toe to toe with the iPad.

"It's no coincidence that Samsung's latest products look a lot like the iPhone and iPad, from the shape of the hardware to the user interface and even the packaging," an Apple spokeswoman said in an email. "This kind of blatant copying is wrong and, as we've said many times before, we need to protect Apple's intellectual property when companies steal our ideas."