Research in Motion, the maker of the popular BlackBerry handsets, has urged the Canadian government to stop the selling of Nortel’s wireless assets to Sweden’s Ericsson in order to stop a “national treasure” from falling into foreign hands.

“We felt like we were snookered,” BlackBerry President & co-CEO Mike Lazaridis on Friday told a parliamentary committee of Nortel’s refusal to let his company bid for its wireless business July 28, writes Deccan Herald.

Ericsson did win the auction in New York with $1.13 billion. Nortel is a 127 year old company based in Toronto and has been a global name in telecom equipment. The company is now selling its assets in order to pay creditors after suffering losses of $5 billion last year.