40Furthermore, it follows from the case-law that, when the Commission adopts rules of conduct and by publishing them announces that they will henceforth apply to the cases to which they relate, the Commission imposes a limit on the exercise of its discretion and cannot depart from those rules under pain of being found, where appropriate, to be in breach of the general principles of law, such as equal treatment or the protection of legitimate expectations (see, to that effect, judgment of 16 February 2017, H&R ChemPharm v Commission, C‑95/15 P, not published, EU:C:2017:125, paragraph 57). In the present case, the Commission restricted itself in the exercise of its discretionary power in the handling of complaints by the adoption of its Notice on cooperation within the Network of Competition Authorities (OJ 2004 C 101, p. 43), which contains guidance seeking to clarify, inter alia, the conditions under which either the Commission or a single national competition authority, or several national competition authorities, is or are best placed to examine a complaint.