Four men are on trial in Moscow accused of involvement in the killing of Russian investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya.
The men are not charged with Ms Politkovskaya's murder, but of taking part in the plot.
Despite protests from Ms Politkovskaya's family, the trial is likely to be held behind closed doors because one of the defendants, Pavel Ryaguzov, is an agent with the Federal Security Service.
Mr Ryaguzov is suspected of having provided Ms Politkovskaya's home address to her killers and has been charged with abuse of office.
The others are former police officer Sergei Khadzhikurbanov and two Chechen brothers, Dzhabrail and Ibragim Makhmudov, who are accused of following the journalist in the weeks before her killing.
Anna Politkovskaya, a crusading newspaper journalist and one of the few prominent independent voices in Russia's media world, was shot dead outside her home in Moscow in October 2006 in an apparent contract killing.
She wrote her investigative reports for the bi-weekly Novaya Gazeta newspaper. Many of her stories concerned human rights abuses carried out by Russian troops and pro-Moscow militias in Chechnya.
The alleged killer, Rustam Makhmudov, has never been found and is said by investigators to have fled the country.
The person who ordered the contract killing has also never been identified and no motive has so far been mentioned.
