46As regards the appellant's main argument alleging a distortion of the scope of Article 12(2) of the 1976 Act and a mistaken assessment by the Court of First Instance of the true legal nature of the contested act which alone brings about a change in his legal position, the contention that, in order to determine whether an act may be the subject of a challenge in an action under Article 230 EC, it is the substance of the act in question and the intention of its author which should be taken into account, is well founded. According to settled case-law, the form in which an act or decision is adopted is in principle irrelevant to the right to challenge such acts or decisions by way of an application for annulment (see, in particular, Commission v Council, cited above, paragraph 42, and IBM v Commission, paragraph 9).
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