Lawyers representing former president Lech Walesa have appealed to the head of the state-sponsored Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) about the procedure for making available certain communist-era files about the Solidarity activist and leader.

Walesa’s lawyers want IPN to stop treating their client as a former secret agent of the security services.

In June 2008, IPN published a book making the case that Walesa had served as a secret informant in the 1970s, several years prior to the Solidarity revolution.

Lech Walesa: A Contribution to the Biography, by historians Slawomir Cenckiewicz and Piotr Gontarczyk drew on numerous state documents, claiming that Walesa was registered as an informant in December 1970, under the codename Bolek.

The book challenged a previous ruling by the so-called lustration court in 2000, that appeared to clear Walesa of suspicion.

Lech Walesa has always vigorously denied the charges. In 2010 he attempted to sue journalist and former dissident Krzysztof Wyszkowski for defamation of character regarding the affair, but failed.

Walesa’s current appeal focuses on access to certain documents that IPN has not released as of yet.

However, amendments to the procedure regarding access to files were made in May 2010, thus entitling those suspected of being informers by IPN with the right to view the materials.

“This is why we appealed,” says Roman Nowosielski, one of Walesa’s lawyers.

However, Andrzej Arseniuk, a spokesman for IPN, said that “the letter of Mr Walesa’s lawyers has still not reached us.”

“If it arrives, the Institute will respond to the matter.” (mg)

Source: Gazeta Wyborcza