apply-imports and recursion used together

Can someone explain to me the technical reason behind the following:

The following template exists in an imported stylesheet:

<xsl:template match="FORUMTHREADPOSTS" mode="postblocks">
        <xsl:param name="skip" select="0"/>
	<xsl:param name="PostRange" select="concat(($skip + 1), ' - ', ($skip + 
@COUNT))"/>
	<xsl:param name="postblockon" select="concat($alt_nowshowing, ' ', 
$PostRange)"/>
	<xsl:param name="postblockoff" select="concat($alt_show, ' ', 
$PostRange)"/>
	<a 
href="{$root}F{(_at_)FORUMID}?thread={@THREADID}&amp;skip={$skip}&amp;show={(_at_)COUNT}">
                <xsl:choose>
                        <xsl:when test="@SKIPTO = $skip">
                                <xsl:copy-of select="$postblockon"/>
                        </xsl:when>
                        <xsl:otherwise>
                                <xsl:copy-of select="$postblockoff"/>
                        </xsl:otherwise>
                </xsl:choose>
        </a>
        <xsl:if test="($skip + @COUNT) &lt; @TOTALPOSTCOUNT">
                <xsl:apply-templates select="." mode="postblocks">
                        <xsl:with-param name="skip" select="$skip + @COUNT"/>
                </xsl:apply-templates>
        </xsl:if>
</xsl:template>

The template works in the way I would expect it. However if an apply-imports 
template is used in the including template I get an infinite loop:
<xsl:template match="FORUMTHREADPOSTS" mode="postblocks">
  <xsl:apply-imports/>
</xsl:template>

reagrds

Tom

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