The war between Ferrari and McLaren-Mercedes continues to rage on as the FIA president, Max Mosley, revealed that following Ferrari's violent dissatisfaction with the outcome of last week's World Motor Sport Council hearing, he has referred the matter to the FIA's appeal court.

Ferrari expressed their hope that before the Appeal Court, "as the injured party of the incident, (they) will be accorded all the rights to which they are entitled in a trial, which was not the case at the World Council meeting."

Last week FIA said McLaren-Mercedes Formula One team won’t be sanctioned in the “spy” scandal with their rivals Ferrari. Tough, FIA acknowledged McLaren-Merdes was in possession of confidential Ferrari information and is therefore in breach of article 151c of the International Sporting Code.

"However, there is insufficient evidence that this information was used in such a way as to interfere improperly with the FIA Formula One World Championship. We therefore impose no penalty," the FIA said in a statement after a meeting of its World Motor Sport Council.

Ferrari was furious that McLaren were not sanctioned and named the ruling "incomprehensible."

Also on Tuesday, the Ferrari board gave its nod to a wide range of further action in the affair in which former Ferrari head of performance Nigel Stepney gave classified team material to ex-McLaren chief designer Mike Coughlan.

Ferrari said in a statement its leaders have "the full authority ... to initiate and continue any necessary legal action, in the name of the company, in addition to those legal actions already underway in every legal, civil, criminal, administrative, sporting jurisdiction be it, in Italy or abroad."

As a response to FIA’ decision to refer the problem to the Appeal Court, McLaren have insisted that the material was not known to other team officials and not used to alter the car, and lashed out at Ferrari and the FIA in a statement.

McLaren said FIA bowed to "a thoroughly misleading press campaign by Ferrari and pressure from the Automobile Club D' Italia" when it referred the case to the appeal body.

"McLaren is not aware of any new information or arguments that have arisen since the meeting of the World Motor Sport Council."

"Whilst this is both disappointing and time-consuming, McLaren is confident that the FIA International Court of Appeal will also exonerate McLaren and we will in the meanwhile continue to focus on our current World Championship programme," the team said.