EU legal
professional privilege has developed
in a particular field of EU law, namely EU competition law,
in the
context of investigations carried out by the competent EU competition law authority, the European Commission (the Commission) into violations of the provisions of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union prohibiting anticompetitive agreements and abuse of a dominant position (although,
in principle, the privilege could protect communications relating to other proceedings brought by the Commission
in which the rights of defence
arise).