In 2017, a new Act on the Supreme Court came into force. It introduced in-to the Polish law, the institution of “extraordinary appeal”, which was to be considered by the IKNSP. In January 2020, Attorney General Zbigniew Ziobro filed such an appeal against the valid judgment in the case initiated by L. Wałęsa’s claim with the declared aim of “ensuring compliance with the principle of a democratic state governed by the rule of law and implementing the principles of social justice”. According to L. Wałęsa, he had only two weeks to reply to the appeal. He argued, inter alia, that the appeal was unconstitutional and amoun-ted to a breach of the principle of legal certainty. He later demanded, unsuccessfully, the recusal of 17 judges of the aforementioned Chamber, including judge Aleksander Stęp-kowski, all of whom had been appointed in violation of law. The IKNSP overturned the 2011 judgment of the Court of Appeal issued in favour of L. Wałę-sa, invoking, inter alia, Articles 8 and 10 of the Convention.
K. Wyszkowski, in turn, filed an application with the Court (no. 34282/12) alleging a violation of Article 10 of the Convention in relation to the order to publish an apology for statements concerning L. Wałęsa. The application was removed from the Court’s list of cases after the Court accepted the govern-ment’s unilateral declaration of 2021 indicating that the issues raised in the application had been resolved.