According to a Monday statement by Taiwanese handset maker HTC, some of the shipments of two of the company's smartphones - the One X and the Evo 4G LTE - which have been under review by US Customs because of an Apple patent dispute, have received Customs clearance and have been released to carrier customers.

The hold up of HTC handsets in US Customs was largely a result of a "limited exclusion order" issued by the International Trade Commission (ITC). The order makes its mandatory for the HTC smartphones to pass a Customs review before hitting the US markets.

The exclusion order was issued by the ITC on December 19 last year, after the agency ruled that HTC had infringed on an Apple patent. The order, which took effect on April 19, bans the import of HTC handsets which use the technology that the agency ruled as having violated Apple's patent.

Meanwhile, it was in an "active clarification" pertaining to the inspection status of HTC devices by US customs that the company disclosed that "some models" of handsets had started coming into the U. S. through customs review.

Refraining from specifying as to which of the models had passed the Customs review, HTC simply mentioned in an investor statement: "We don't have the status of each specific device at this time. We remain confident that this issue will be resolved soon."