Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin, on Monday, accused US President Donald Trump’s administration of abusing “national power” by trying to ban TikTok after a US federal court gave the app’s US operations a stay of execution.

The US government has released an order to ban new downloads of TikTok from midnight. However, it has allowed the use of the popular app until November 12, when all users would be blocked.

The President has earlier claimed that the Chinese-owned app is a threat to the national security and harvests data for Beijing through its parent company ByteDance.

Also read: Federal judge blocks US President Donald Trump’s ban on TikTok downloads

Wenbin described the order as “bullying behaviour” and said that it was evidence of “abusing national power to unreasonably suppress other countries’ enterprises.”

Instead, the US should “provide a fair, just, open, and non-discriminatory business environment for companies around the world investing and operating in the country,” Wang added.

Although, late on Sunday, a US federal court issued a temporary block on the order after TikTok’s lawyers successfully argued it was a “punitive” ban motivated by politics rather than genuine security fears.

Also read: TikTok will survive Donald Trump, US users say

The parent company ByteDance is discussing the transfer of ownership to Silicon Valley giant Oracle. 

TikTok said on Sunday that it would “maintain its ongoing dialogue with the government” on the plan, which has received preliminary approval from Trump.

However, it is still unclear whether the deal would be approved by China, where some consider the plan as an unjustified appropriation of Chinese technology.