The four have been charged with helping organise the Oct 2006 shooting of Politovskaya at her apartment block in central Moscow.

In a victory for Politkovskaya's lawyers who had feared the process could be held in secret, the judge of the Russian military court ruled that the trial should be held in open court.

'I reject the request of the prosecutors that the trial should proceed behind closed doors. But I will close the trial if there is pressure on the jurors,' Judge Yevgeny Zubov said.

One of the lawyers for Politkovskaya's family, Ms Karinna Moskalenko, welcomed the move, 'I did not expect that this decision would be taken. With this judge there is the chance of a fair trial,' she told reporters.

The slain journalist's family and supporters have long expressed scepticism over the legal process and complained that none of the four defendants being tried is charged with the actual killing.

Politkovskaya wrote books and articles that fiercely criticised Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, notably for abuses committed by Russian forces during the second Chechen war, which he oversaw as president.

More than two years after Politkovskaya was shot dead on Oct 7, 2006, the authorities have failed to arrest the hitman who pulled the trigger or those who ultimately ordered the murder.

One of the suspects on trial is a former agent of the FSB security service, the successor to the Soviet-era KGB. Pavel Ryaguzov is suspected of providing Politkovskaya's home address to the killer.

Two of the other defendants, Dzhabrail and Ibragim Makhmudov, are Chechen brothers accused of following her in her last weeks.

They are brothers of Rustam Makhmudov - the man said by investigators to have actually shot Politkovskaya in the stairwell of her apartment block. He has never been found and is said by investigators to have fled the country.

The fourth defendant is Sergei Khadzhikurbanov, a former police investigator from the Moscow police's organised crime unit.

The masterminds of the presumed contract killing have never even been identified, despite a statement in Oct 2006 by then-president Putin that Politkovskaya's murder was 'an unacceptable crime that cannot go unpunished.'

Ms Moskalenko noted the authorities did not interview Ramzan Kadyrov, the political strongman of Chechnya who she said 'had threatened Politovskaya.'

'The investigators also ignored the fact that the murder took place on Vladimir Putin's birthday,' she added.

Defence lawyer Murad Mussayev dismissed the process as merely a trial of 'two drivers and a go-between.'

'We want the world to see that the goal of this trial is to show that a major crime has been solved when that is not true.'

Mr Dmitry Muratov, the editor of Politovskaya's newspaper, Novaya Gazeta, has accused secret service agents of organising and coordinating the murder.

The journalist's son, Ilya Politkovsky, told AFP ahead of the trial, 'I don't have any hope that the name of the person who ordered the killing will be revealed.'

The shooting as Politovskaya returned home carrying bags of groceries from a shopping trip, sparked outrage internationally and among opposition groups in Russia, with some critics pointing the finger of blame at the Russian leadership.

In comments days after her death, Putin promised the killers would be punished but also angered Politkovskaya's supporters by saying her impact on Russian life had been minimal.

The Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based media freedom organisation, ranks Russia as the third deadliest country in the world for journalists after Iraq and Algeria, with 49 journalists killed since 1992. -- AFP