In its judgment of 13 November 1990, in Case C-106/89, Marleasing/Comercial Internacional de Alimentación, the Court of Justice points out that, in applying national law, whether the provisions in question were adopted before or after a directive, the national court called upon to interpret it is required to do so, as far as possible, in the light of the wording and the purpose of the directive in order to achieve the result pursued by the latter and thereby comply with the third paragraph of Article 189 of the EEC Treaty (now Article 249 of the EC Treaty).